


Run Over

by Robronsnuggles



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Alternate Universe, Amnesia, Angst, Businessman Robert, Enemies to Lovers, Handyman Aaron, M/M, Overboard (1987) AU, fake marriage au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:08:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 37,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21755815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Robronsnuggles/pseuds/Robronsnuggles
Summary: Robert Sugden has reached a high point in his life. Born rich beyond his wildest dreams, owns a successful business, engaged to a beautiful woman, everything is just perfect for him, and yet something is just off. What he doesn’t expect is for his life to take a turn for the worse and with a car accident and just a few words from a certain handyman, his life turns upside down.“I can’t believe he doesn’t remember me. Everything’s gonna be OK. Now.... I am your husband. My name is Aaron Dingle.”
Relationships: Aaron Dingle/Robert Sugden, Adam Barton/Victoria Sugden
Comments: 12
Kudos: 67
Collections: Emmerdale Big Bang Round 3 2019





	1. Time for a Change

After a tiring day at the office of having to deal with clients who thought they were masters of the world and dealing with the odd fumbles his employees made, Robert Sugden is ready to finally go home. _Home,_ he thinks, _if one could even call that place home_. The one place that is meant to feel warm, cozy, and comfortable feels more like a showroom the way his fiance, Chrissie White, has decided to redecorate it. When it came to deciding things for the both of them, Chrissie usually got her way. It must just be one of those incompatible things all couples have. One thing that sets them apart from the rest as well as from each other. At times, he wonders how his life came to this point. That’s when he remembers that this was more or less planned by both of their parents. 

The Sugdens and the Whites are two of the most powerful and wealthy families in the world. While the Sugdens have a long history of prosperity in the farming industry, the Whites are new upcomers that have made their fortune in farming machinery. While Robert Sugden was respected for his business acumen, he was also accused of being a playboy and a heartbreaker from the multiple scandals of his cheating escapades. To help ground him, his step-mother, Diane, had made an ultimatum. If he kept on sullying the Sugden name with his “activities”, then he would have to forfeit half of his inheritance to his brother, Andy. If Diane had said it would go to his baby sister, Victoria, he wouldn’t have minded as he loves her to bits and the amount of money he would have been left with is plenty satisfactory to live off of however, Robert does not do charity for his adopted brother. 

Him meeting Chrissie White happened because Diane had invited the Whites and many others to multiple events in hopes that he would find someone to be happy with. Chrissie was a beautiful sight that had caught his eye and after a bit of flirting and many promises of more, they seemed to hit it off. Now, Robert didn’t have Diane fussing over him as they both seemed happy with his and Chrissie's relationship. While Robert and Chrissie did share an affection for each other, it was more the idea of what this relationship brought to them that helped it survive for so long. Chrissie is an intelligent and powerful businesswoman which meant she knew that being in a relationship with Robert would only benefit her status and Robert knew that being with Chrissie would keep his name out of the papers and rid him of the title of the most scandalous rich boy in the UK. While their relationship had its ups and downs, they were able to work through things the best they could, even if that meant sweeping some things under the cover. 

When Robert decided that he should finally cement himself in the Sugden name, he proposed to Chrissie and she accepted. And so far, he felt like this is where he should be, with her and out of trouble, no more worries and no more scandals, basically the perfect version of someone who has it all. Although something felt amiss for him even though he didn’t know what it could possibly be. 

As he sits in his car, he notices a small rip in his passenger's seat. _How in the world did this get here?,_ he wonders. He runs his finger over it gently and determines that it seems deep enough that it needs to be professionally mended. His face winces at the thought of having to do any more work as he just wants to fall onto his bed and not wake up for the next week. 

That’s when it hits him. _Why mend it when I can get all new seat covers?,_ he thinks. He has the money to spend and it would be a nice change for him. Moved by that impulse, he pulls out his phone and looks for a local handyman. After a quick search, he finds someone that advertises quality work along with excellent reviews and decides to give them a call. As it rung, he only then realized that it was way too late for anyone to answer, so he settled with leaving a voicemail.

"You've reached Dingle handyman services. Leave your name and number and I'll get back to ya."

_*beep*_

"This is Robert Sugden and I am interested in using your services to get my seat covers replaced. Call me back."

With that, he puts his phone away feeling a bit better about his day. _Another job done,_ he thinks to himself. He starts his car and drives home with a hint of a smile on his face.

* * * * *

When someone thinks of Dingle, they usually think of the garage run by the infamous Cain Dingle but recently, another Dingle name came to the forefront of everyone’s mind as Aaron Dingle started his own handyman business. He was still fresh to the whole business idea, but his hard effort and quality work soon had customers rolling in. Aaron had only been working as a handyman for a few years but he has gained a lot of experience that helped him spread his services to a larger area. While he lives in Emmerdale, Aaron holds a small office in Hotten since he gets most of his work from there. 

Aaron was never a morning person so getting up early for a parts delivery was definitely an unpleasant experience. He barely crawled out of bed before he heard his mum, Chas, speaking loudly in the pub below. 

She was a great mum, even though she wasn’t so much before. She left him when he was still just a kid because she didn’t think she could handle being a mom, not with all the fights she had with Aaron’s dad. She thought she was leaving him in good hands until Aaron was kicked out onto the streets at the age of sixteen and she had to pick him up from a police station. She took him under her wing and tried to right all the wrongs she made. After a lot of mistakes and with the help of her somewhat ex-boyfriend vet, Paddy, she and Aaron grew to being closer than ever. Now, she owns and runs the local pub, which gives Aaron the perks of a few free pints after work as well as a place to sleep. She supported him greatly when he decided to make his own business. Funnily enough, she was actually the one that got him his first job working at the garage by convincing her brother, Cain, to take him on, which he begrudgingly did. Of course, Aaron showed that he was more than some little thug that terrorized the public and quickly earned his uncle’s respect which helped Cain decide to help him in starting the handyman business. 

“Aaron, is that you?”, Chas called out. 

_Shit._ Aaron thought he could sneak away unnoticed. 

He sighs, “Yeah! What’d you want?”

“Well, good morning to you grumpy. Now, help your mum with this delivery. Marlon must have thought we were facing the end of days with the amount of stuff he ordered!”

“Sure, be there in a sec.”

He found Chas at the pub’s bar waiting for him. 

“Now, why do I have to do this?”

“Cuz you’re my son and you need to earn your keep here somehow,” she answers teasingly. 

“Why don’t you just hire someone? I’m sure you can use an extra bartender on hand.”

“And what, pay them out of thin air?,” Chas exasperates, “I just don’t have that kind of cash.”

Aaron huffs, but he understands so he helps her bring in the rest of the stuff in without a fuss. By the time he finishes, it is right around the time for him to be at the office for his own delivery. 

“See you later,” he tells Chas. 

“Wait, a second.”

“What! I’m gonna be late.”

“Aaron, just make sure you’re not working yourself too hard. You know with the business and having to take care of a kid when you’re basically a kid yourself. It's a hard thing to do. It’s not a crime to have fun now and again.”

He knew what she was talking about. Liv, his little sister. She was the greatest thing to happen to him but at the same time she was a nightmare. She showed up on their doorstep one night saying that she ran from home and this is the only other place her mum, Sandra, ever mentioned to have any sort of family. When Chas asked what happened, Liv said that after her mum and dad divorced, not long after Aaron had been kicked out, Sandra got worse. She would be tired all the time, forgetful, and close to the point of being paranoid. Liv didn’t want to constantly be moved around for no reason and she thought her mum only did it because she kept on fancying a change. 

Aaron knew the real reason why her mum was like this. She was trying to get them away from _him_ , their dad. He never thought that he would ever tell people the horrible things that happened to him and to this day he still can’t believe he did. Liv coming into his life helped give him the courage to tell Chas about the nights he kept trying to forget and, with his family at his side, he was able to get justice. He promised that he would be a proper big brother to Liv and that she could stay with him if she wanted to. It didn’t take her long to say yes. 

This led to them all living under the same roof in the pub and, while she is a good kid, she was definitely challenging. Stubborn as Aaron and too clever for her own good. She would constantly be up to something which meant Aaron got many calls from the school about it. While he tries his best to balance everything, Chas can see it can be too much sometimes. 

“I don’t have the time for that. You know what it’s like,” Aaron replies.

“Well, I still think you need to enjoy yourself.”

“Thanks, but now I really gotta go.”

“Ok, sweetie. I’ll see ya.”

He scowls at the nickname and leaves through the back door. 

The drive to his office wasn’t too long which Aaron was grateful for. Otherwise he would have had to start living in Hotten and that wouldn’t have been good for his little sister. He wanted her to be around family. He smiled at the thought of how much more comfortable Liv has become amongst all the Dingle craziness. He finds a parking spot just before his office and heads in. As soon as he comes into his office, the first thing he does is make a brew before facing the workload for the day. His office is small but it fits his needs. He got himself a cheap rented space which has all the necessities. While the kettle was heating up, he notices a flashing light coming from the office phone. He goes over and hits play to hear what voicemails he got.

_You have 2 new messages._

_*beep*_

"Hey Aaron! Uhh- I can't help you out tomorrow. Mum's got me going to this thing last minute and you know how she is. If I show up late, that’s me dead then. At least it's been slow so you shouldn't be swamped without me. Talk later."

Adam. Aaron has been friends with Adam since forever which is why they worked so well together. While Adam was still mainly helping his mum out on the farm, he was always there to help Aaron with the odd job here and there. 

He plays the next message.

_*beep*_

"This is Robert Sugden and I am interested in using your services to get my seat covers replaced. Call me back."

 _Well, that was informative_ , Aaron thought sarcastically, but he can’t really argue with how his customers try to get in touch since business is business and all that. In the end, any type of cover replacement is bound to bring in a decent amount of cash. As he is about to call the number, the kettle whistles. Aaron goes over to get a cup to warm himself up. He then gets settled back in his chair as comfortably as possible and reaches for the phone to call the number. Aaron sips at his cup while the phone rings.

"Robert Sugden speaking."

"Heya. It's Aaron Dingle. You called about getting your seat covers replaced?"

"Yes!”, Robert says enthusiastically. “When can you come out to get the job done?"

"Well, I can start on it today but I'll need to know a few things first. Like car model, type of sea-“

"Ah yes. It’s an Audi R8 4.2 and the seats are faux lea-,” there’s a pause before Aaron hears a muffled, “ _I'll get on it in a moment!”_ Just as Aaron was about to ask if everything’s ok, the guy comes back on the line, “Sorry. Look could you just come by and take a look at it? I'm a bit busy at the moment."

"Ah, sure, where?" Aaron says hesitantly.

"Address is 1204 Layby Street."

"Right, got it."

"Great, see you later." 

“See y-” and the line goes dead. Robert hung up on him mid phrase.

 _What a dick!_ Aaron thought. He sighed as he thought of what a pain this job is turning out to be. _This better be worth it._

* * * * *

When Aaron arrives to the place, all he could think of was that he did not expect anything like this. The place was enormous and had the air of money about it. The fence around the property was stylish yet simple and driving in, he could see that everything was well maintained. It had a very modern exterior and the landscaping in front of the house was exquisite. It also had a fantastic view of the lake beside it. Although remote, this place was beautiful. Aaron knew then that this job could be _very_ well worth it. He sees the cars out in the driveway before the house and he is amazed at how many and how gorgeous the cars were. He parks his car and then starts to go up the walkway towards the house until he notices some small movement from the second floor window. He sees that the curtains are slightly open and a blonde figure is moving behind them. Aaron doesn’t look any further and walks straight to the door and rings the doorbell. 

After waiting for around a minute, he rings again. Still, no answer. He tries to listen to behind the door and heard a muffled whirring. He then knocks loudly on the door and gets an immediate answer.

“Yes! What do you want?”, Robert asks.

“Uh-,” Aaron is caught off guard as a man that could be a model answers the door. His eyes were a striking blue with hints of green and the freckles on his face stood at as he leaned out of the doorframe and the sun lit his face. His hair was blonde with some golden streaks and it was styled to look as if it was an effortless task to look this handsome. His clothes seemed to be casual but on him, the white button down shirt that he had rolled at the sleeves and the indigo blue jeans looked like they were off the runway. Aaron was stunned.

“Hello?,” Robert said waving his hand in Aaron's face. 

Snapping out of his daze, “I’m Aaron Dingle. Here about the seat covers?”

“Oh yeah, sorry about that. Got some remodeling going on in the living room. Been doing my head in all day.”

 _I can see that_ , thinks Aaron, _but maybe he’s not too bad._

“Come in then!” Robert almost demands in an annoyed tone.

_Nope, definitely a dick._

Aaron walks into the lavish home that seems to be filled with multiple edgy items yet presents a sense of openness. Though he doesn’t understand why the furniture is literally all cubed, like, there was a huge rectangle for what seemed like the couch and smaller cubes beside it. _Well, that’s fashion, innit?_

While Aaron was admiring the latest additions, Robert took a closer look at this man. A rugged exterior that seemed to hide something more underneath that black hoodie with white strings and that grey shirt. Robert couldn’t deny himself as his eyes travelled down and he found a perfect fit of black jeans on a perfect ass. He could feel himself getting warmer by the second-

“Robert! Is that the delivery man for my cubist piece?”

“No, Chrissie!” He sighs and shouts up to the second floor. “It’s for me.”

“Well, make sure to tell me if he comes, alright? Can’t hear a thing with this hairdryer.”

“Yes, I will.”

Robert drags a hand down his face and looks over at Aaron. 

“See what it’s like?,” he tries to laugh off. 

“Yeah. Hellish.”

Robert looks back at Aaron and notices a smirk on his face. He thinks to himself, _that looks good on him._ Robert is almost finding himself lost in those deep blue eyes that keep drawing him in. He notices that his hair was styled with gel that made him look even more mature than his beard did. His eyes look down at Aaron’s lips- no, he needed to stop these thoughts. He knows he shouldn’t be thinking things like this about a handyman he hired but he couldn’t help himself. His handyman was definitely a handsome stud of a man. That’s when he thinks that maybe he should start being nicer to the man that was helping him with his favorite car. 

“Want anything to drink before we get down to business?”, Robert asked pointing towards his wet bar. 

“Nah, I’m good.”

“Alright then. Well, feel free to come in here and get yourself a drink. Wouldn’t want my handyman dying of thirst now would we?,” Robert says in a flirtatious tone. 

Aaron felt a blush coming on as this guy was so obviously coming on to him when it was evident he had a missus. He took a quick glance at Robert’s hands and saw a simple band on his ring finger. _And he’s married at that! What’s this guy thinking?!_ He turns his head trying to ignore it, hoping that he is just misreading all of it, and gave more of a grunt for a response. 

“Right, well. What needs doing?”, Aaron asks. 

“Well, my passenger’s seat has got a rip in it so I decided to change all my seat covers. They are due for a change anyway.”

Aaron stares at Robert. _If I had that kind of money, I would put it to good use rather than waste it on something so minor,_ he thinks. _Well, as long as the pay goes to me in the end._

“Right, so you said yours is the Audi out front right?”

“Yep, and I want it all redone in a red leather. When do you think you can get it done by?”

Aaron takes a moment to make an accurate estimate. “Well, it’ll take time for the parts to come in but the work itself should take no more than two weeks.”

“All right, let’s say three weeks and I’ll pay £3,500 for parts and labor and the car stays here.”

Aaron was not expecting that high of a price but he also wondered if he could push it.

“£4,000. For the mileage back and forth,” he says nonchalantly.

Robert looks at him and smirks. He likes the fire he sees in his eyes and loves it when somebody thinks they can challenge him. 

“Alright, deal. But let’s make it two weeks then,” he smugly grins. 

Aaron thinks for a bit and knows he can have this job done within a week thanks to some of his handy contacts. He can stretch that out into two weeks worth of work. 

“Alright then, deal.”

Robert reaches out his hand and Aaron takes it. They both feel a slight sensation at the others touch, almost electrifying. They shake hands while each holds their breath, as if expecting something more, and don’t seem to let go until there is a ring at the door. Robert releases his grip.

“That’ll be Chrissie’s sculpture,” Robert says slightly hoarse. 

“Yeah,” Aaron clears his throat. “Right, I better get on it then.”

“Good, here are the keys,” Robert says as he tosses them to Aaron. Aaron then starts to walk past him and just as he is mostly in Robert’s personal space, Robert leans in and says, “Have fun.”

Aaron quickened his pace to leave but not without glancing back at Robert. He took a look over this man one last time as though he is unable to look anywhere else. He felt as though he had this insatiable hunger for the man that continued to stare at him and thought, _Fuck._ Aaron knows he wants him. He knows nothing could come of it, but still, he wants him. _Forget about it! I just really need to get this job over with,_ he thought to himself. He quickly turned back around and headed towards the car outside. 

He looked over at the Audi parked in the driveway and just stares at it. Not often does he get the chance to work on such classy cars, even at the garage, so that became a nice bonus to the job. He opens the car door and takes a look inside. The interior looks so well taken care of that he would pass it off as though it was brand new. He sits in the front seat and places his hands around the steering wheel, reveling in the feeling of being in such a nice car. _Someday,_ he thinks to himself, _this could be my life_. He shakes himself out of his silly daydream and gets to taking measurements of all the seats.

* * * * *

Saturday, the start of the weekend. _Finally, a day off,_ Robert thought to himself, _Chrissie is off to the shops and I get the house to myself_ . He was ready to relax after the week from hell. He had many deals that he was working on as well as some new clients come in so he had to work his extra charm to make sure they sealed the deal. He loved doing his job because he knew that what his clients really bought into was him. He ensured them the best service because he is the best. Of course, his family doesn’t always see that. His father, the infamous Jack Sugden, that brought a new meaning to farming would not see Robert as a hardworking business owner and salesman, but rather a lazy excuse for a farmer’s son. He would not see the talent Robert had with his words as they were no match to the talent he should have with his hands. That is why Andy was always the golden boy of the family. Although he is duller than a pencil, his strength and persistence on the farm earned Jack’s praise. Robert had always felt that it was more or less his own fault for bringing him into the family only to have him replace his own standing as Jack’s son. He remembers how he found Andy in the outer fields of the farm and played tag with him. Robert thought he made a great friend and when he brought him home, it was found out that he was abandoned there. Robert begged his father to have him stay. _Boy what a mistake that was,_ Robert thought. Jack let him stay and had him tag along with Robert to help on the farm. Robert hated farm work while Andy loved it and that is the main wedge that brought them apart. His father would prefer spending time with Andy rather than his own son and that hurt, but not as much as when Jack announced he was going to officially adopt him into the family. Now that really hurt. Thankfully, his mum, Sarah, and his sister, Victoria, were there for him. He would kick up a fuss but Sarah would be there for him like she always was. She would tell him how proud she was of his good grades, how great his essays were, and she never made him feel worthless. That is until the accident. A car crash that ended in a horrible fire. She was driving home and she was run off the road by some speeding car. Her car flipped and she lost consciousness so there was no way she could have escaped the fire that followed. Nothing compared to the grief Robert felt for his mum and for his little sister that would have to grow up without her. She was the one person that truly loved him unconditionally and he lost her. He missed her. After some months, Andy made a passing comment about how she wasn’t even his real mum and he punched him in the face for that because to Robert she was and they just got worse from there on as Robert would do cruel and thoughtless things in response to Andy’s constant oppressing presence and hurtful actions. 

Robert pulled himself out of those thoughts. He shouldn’t be thinking of the past as there is only the future to focus on. A few days have passed since Robert had made the deal with the handyman and to his word, Aaron was working on it bit by bit. He looked out of his window and saw him bending over into the car trying to get to something. _Well, this is definitely a nice way to start the day off,_ Robert thought. He was just about to go downstairs to make himself a cup of Americano when his phone rang. 

“Robert Sugden speaking.”

“Heya Robert. It’s Jimmy.” _Oh no,_ Robert thought. His assistant calling him this early was never a good thing. 

“What is it Jimmy?”

“Oh well...it’s just...I mean-”

“Just spit it out!”

“Yeah, right. Sorry. You remember the French lady who came by about a week ago?”

“Of course, what about her?”

“Well, she made an order to have a certain part delivered to her and she was expecting it today.”

“OK, if the order was made she would have received it. I’m not seeing the problem.”

“Well, that’s the thing. We were so busy that her order, well, it was-”

“Jimmy, don’t tell me you forgot to place her order! She is a very promising client and her connections in France are crucial to our expansion. How can you be such an idiot!”

“I’m sorr-”

“No, you are going to go to the site and see to it that you personally deliver her that part tomorrow!”

“But-”

“No buts! I am going to call her and mend the damage before you make it any worse. You better be on your way there in the next five minutes!”

“Yes, sir!”

_Damn! I knew this day started off too well. Well, better get that Americano and get back to business._

* * * * *

Aaron decided to come in on a Saturday since business was pretty slow and if he was honest, he couldn’t wait to get his hands back on that car. He was in the process of getting the seats stripped when he felt a gaze on him. He looked around and saw no one but just before he got back to it, he heard a noise from above. He saw the blonde turning away from the window answering his phone. Aaron didn’t know what to think of that until he could hear him shouting at the phone. _Somebody’s pissed off._ He got back to work as though he heard nothing, not really wanting to know what caused Robert to be so angry. 

After some time had passed, Aaron was ready to take a break. When Aaron tried the door to the house, he found that it was open. He went inside to get himself a cup of coffee and he noticed Robert. He was dressed casually, with a simple grey long sleeve shirt and a loose pair of jeans. He was on the phone on one hand and held a cup in the other. 

“Oui madame, mais bien sûr! Tu sais que je suis bien sur ma parole ,” Robert says. 

Now Aaron has a limited knowledge of French but he could make out the words, ‘of course’, ‘you know’, and ‘good on my word’. 

  
“Ah, tres bien! Je vous parlerai plus tard. Au revoir,” Robert says sweetly. 

‘Very good’, ‘talk later’, ‘bye’.

It seems Robert noticed Aaron staring at him as he glances over and smiles. 

_Boy, what a charmer,_ Aaron thinks sarcastically. 

He heads back out towards his own car to get himself the bag of crisps he took with him as a snack. As he reaches in for the bag, he hears a loud scream. 

“Aaagh! Fuck that’s hot!”

Aaron looks up towards the window and he sees Robert with his elbows lifted, from what he could tell. Aaron tries to see if something is wrong but he can’t. So he walks out to get a better view into the window and he could see that Robert was trying to clean something off himself. Aaron guessed he must have spilled whatever was in his cup. Before he could turn around, he saw Robert start to take off his long sleeved shirt up and over his head. Aaron felt bad for peeping on him like this but he couldn’t tear his eyes off of Robert whose toned body with just the right amount of muscle even from Aaron’s perspective was almost impossible to look away from. _Wonder what it all looks like close up,_ Aaron thinks. Robert turned around, with his back towards the window and Aaron continued to gaze up at him. What he didn’t expect was for Robert to suddenly bend over and for his boxers to slip down. Aaron gulped as he saw that Robert chose to wear nothing underneath and he got a full view of his backside. As he was admiring the view, he noticed that Robert had somewhat of a birthmark in the shape of a heart on his upper right cheek. Robert pulled up his jeans and was starting to turn around to which Aaron quickly got back to his car to avoid being caught out. He waited a moment before glancing up again. This time he didn’t see anybody near the window so he breathed out in relief. _Damn, I need to get laid if that’s all it takes to make my heart go racing!_ He gets back to working on the car all the while wondering whether or not that really just happened. 

As the days went on, Aaron was finishing up the seats bit by bit. The only thing that took a while was the leather actually getting here. Aaron was able to get a good deal on some leather seat covers from one of his contacts he did a job for way back and from what the guy said, it definitely had that ‘nice red’ color to it. Even though he got a deal, it was still a hefty chunk out of his savings he had to pay but Aaron knew that as soon as he got the leather in, it’d be a quick job and he would get his promised money from Robert. Aaron smiled at the thought of being able to help his mum out or maybe even get Liv something nice. 

At the same time though, he would really miss working on a car as beautiful as this one. He could say the same about the car’s owner. Even though they barely see each other, Aaron can’t deny that he felt tempted to pleasure himself to the image of the man’s gorgeous body. He tried to get it out of his system by going on the pull but that didn’t quite work out as the only men Aaron seemed to notice were all tall and blonde. He got out of there before he could do anything. _Just a few more days and I’ll never see him again. I’ll return to normal._ Or so he hoped. 

* * * * *

It was getting closer to the end of the two week deadline and Robert had not even had a chance to check on the progress of his car. He was either at work and returning home late, or he was at home trying to get whatever sleep he can. He knew that the deal he helped save from Jimmy’s mistake was going to mean more business, business that Jimmy obviously isn’t able to handle, making it Robert’s duty to see the deals through and make sure that nothing goes wrong. That meant a lot more hours than Robert was really expecting but the possible opportunities he can get out of this kept him going. Although Chrissie did make it a bit hard for him to get some rest. She would ask for his opinion on things he knew she already had made her mind up about and when he tired to give a neutral answer, she would accuse him of not caring. She would say he spends too much time at his job and not enough time on them which would stress them both out. She decided to go on a spa break in hopes that when she returned, Robert would be back to his usual self. Robert was glad for it as this was less stress for him to deal with. 

One thing he does regret is the fact that when he comes home late he doesn’t really get to see his handyman around anywhere. One night he did happen to stay over a bit late and Robert couldn’t help but watch Aaron as he worked. He is glad to see the amount of care Aaron puts into the placement of the seat covers and how he makes sure that there isn’t a single stitch out of place. The light inside the car illuminates Aaron’s face in an almost heavenly glow and Robert couldn’t help but stare. But then the light went off and Aaron backed out of the car and closed the door. Robert could hear his Audi lock and saw Aaron walk towards his own car ready to get out of here. _Shame._ He walks over to look at what Aaron has done and so far everything looked good to him. Through the tinted windows, he could see that the seats were in place and it looked like the handyman did a good job. He couldn’t wait to get back into the driver’s seat. 

He gets up a little later than his usual hour and makes his way downstairs in a bit of a rush. He gets himself some orange juice as he doesn’t have the time to make an Americano. As he opens the door to get out, he sees Aaron just about ready to knock on the door. 

“Oh!,” Aaron jumps back a bit. 

“Sorry, running a bit late,” Robert says as he looks Aaron up and down, admiring his casual attire of a jacket and some jeans that fit him in all the right places. 

Aaron nods in understanding but he doesn’t move. Robert was stood in front of him in a black business suit that accentuated his features by making his blonde hair look brighter and bringing out his eyes that left Aaron speechless at the sight in front of him. 

“What did you need?,” Robert asks. 

“Ah, well, just wanted to let you know that the car should be finished up tonight.”

“That’s good to hear.” Robert huffs, “and you got it all done with one day to spare.”

“Well, that’s the only reason I’d be here this early in the morning.”

“Really,” Robert smiles, “that the only reason,” he poses as if it’s a question.

Aaron pauses. He knows Robert must be toying with him so he says, “Yeah, of course.”

Robert moves in closer, “Well, it is definitely a nice surprise for me,” he says almost seductively. 

Aaron moves back a little and clears his throat, “Anyway, I’ll call ya when it’s done.”

“Ok then. I’ll have the money ready.”

“Sounds great.”

“See ya later then, _Aaron_ ,” he says as he moves past him, brushing up against his chest. 

Aaron looks over at him as he leaves. He’s left feeling more confused now than ever before. Is Robert trying to flirt with him or is he just that much of a schmooze that he just can’t turn it off? Aaron can’t tell and the fact that he’ll be done with this today is all the more better now. He shakes it off and walks inside the house to make himself a brew before he goes out there again. 

* * * * *

Robert was in a good mood when he entered the office that even Jimmy’s bodily orchestra couldn’t dim it. He enters his glass office and opens up his desktop computer. No new urgent emails, no new notifications, and all seems quiet. He checked for any voicemails and came up with nothing. He sees that all his deals at this time seem to be running smoothly as if on automatic. So, he thinks he can take it a bit easier today. As soon as the thought crosses his mind, he hears a knock at the door. 

“Come in.”

Jimmy stumbles in with a big smile on his face, “Good morning boss.”

Robert waves his hand in acknowledgement.

“Well,” Jimmy starts, “nice day we’re having.”

“Get on with it.”

“Okay, the thing is, the client in France, she was very impressed with the company and she sent out an invitation for this company to join her at a retreat.”

“That’s not unusual.”

“Well, Nico….,” and that’s when it hits Robert. He rolls his eyes at Jimmy’s incessant need to please her. Nico is his wife and works with him as well, never a good combination in life but it sorta works for them. She has the brains, and he has the ‘people’ factor. He must have not wanted to disappoint her with his mess up which is why Robert had to deal with it. Robert sighs.

“Spit it out Jimmy.”

“She wants to go there for a three week holiday,” he hurriedly says.

“Well, she can definitely go. She earned it after her deal with the Richardsons. I see no problem with that,” Robert smiles. He knows Jimmy wants to go along with her but he is going to make sure he sees him squirm.

“Uhhh, well, boss, you see… She wants me there with her.”

Robert raised his eyebrows, “Really now. Well, that would be a bit tough seeing as you need to be here dealing with the paperwork.”

Jimmy’s frame visibly drops, “But- Rob- I mean boss. You know how she is.”

“I do, and I know that she would love this retreat with or without you.”

“But bos-”

“No buts. I need someone here to take calls and make sure this business doesn’t fall apart. Jimmy don’t you care about this company?”

“Of course I do! It’s just, it’s getting close to our anniversary and I thought this would be an opportunity to spend some time together.”

Robert looks at him sternly and after a long pause says, “....Expect a lot of paperwork when you return. As well as a strict deadline for _all_ of them.”

“Really, oh thank you! Thank you so much!,” he gets up to leave, “I can’t wait to tell her!” He goes out the door with a skip in his step. 

Robert sits back thinking, _Maybe I’m going soft._ He gets back to his computer and makes sure to forward the news to his other much more competent assistant, Leyla. She was a beautiful woman with a sense for business like no other. While she and Robert worked well together, Chrissie had some early suspicions that the late nights Robert spent at the office were spent with her. In a sense, that was true but only to work on deals that needed extra special attention to ensure nothing went wrong. Robert remembers how embarrassed and sorry he was towards Leyla when Chrissie stormed in the office late at night to accuse them of something sordid. When Robert explained what was going on, she apologized but still held a tone of disbelief at what was truly happening between the two. 

_If anything even was happening, I would hope it would be with that sexy handyman_ , he ponders. _Thinking of which, I better get that cash ready for him._ Robert walks over to the safe in his office and unlocks it to take out the amount of £4,000. _The job that was done is well worth the money as well as the view it gave._ He smiles to himself as he places the cash into an envelope and then puts it inside of his suit pocket. He sits back in his chair and pauses to reread his email, making sure he covered everything Leyla might need to know, when his phone rings. He sees that it's Vic that’s calling him. He smiles as he taps to answer. 

“Hey, Vic.”

“Rob! Guess what I just did!” 

“I’m stumped,” he says playfully.

“Well, you know how there was that local burger contest? You know, the one with a £2,500 prize for making the best burger? Guess who won it!”

“I’m guessing you did?” 

He knows what a cooking enthusiast she is as she started her own restaurant business at the age of eighteen. With the cooking experience she had from experimenting in the kitchen and Robert’s business tips, she made her small dream of owning a restaurant turn into what is now a popular restaurant and food truck chain by the name of Diddy Diner. He couldn’t be more proud of her. She is a great influence on his life as she took on the role of peacekeeper between him and the family and she is always nagging him to spend more time with the family, which he does feel bad for letting her down so many times. It’s just that he really has a hard time dealing with Andy and all the bad memories he brings with him. He misses spending time with her though. 

“YES! And oh my gosh! Robert, this burger is the most amazing thing I’ve ever created! I’m gonna put them in all of my restaurants! Just imagine, getting to eat this prize-winning burger, that’s the best thing you’ve ever tasted, anywhere you like!”

“Yes, and I’m sure that everyone will all be grateful for the extra calories they’ll have to work off the next day,” Robert laughs.

Victoria huffs over the phone. “Well, you haven’t tasted burgers like these though have you? Speaking of which, when are you going to be coming by? Diane’s been asking about you.”

There it is again. Robert pauses. He knows that going there would mean seeing Andy and he really doesn’t want that. 

“Vic,...you know how it is. Work keeps me busy and Jimmy and Nicola are going to a retreat which means I’m more than snowed under.”

“Come on, you need to live your life a little. You can’t be stuck there all the time.”

Robert thinks, business has slowed done for now and he hasn’t seen her in forever, “Fine, I’ll take you up on that burger then. Let’s get together for lunch.”

“That’s great! Let’s say around noonish you’ll come by the house?”

Robert thinks, _Andy should probably still be out working on the farm then, hard worker that he is,_ “Sure, see you then.”

“Bye!”

Robert puts his phone away with a smile as he now gets a chance to catch up with her. He continues to type away on his computer and sends off an email to Leyla about taking an early lunch. 

* * * * *

The drive up to the house doesn’t take too long before Robert reaches the front gate. While his own residence is lavish and gorgeous, compared to this, his place is nothing. The gate is made of gold and it shined spectacularly. The long driveway toward the house is decorated with paved bricks, sided with trimmed bushes and small trees, and adorned with beautiful flower beds. Robert reminisces at how his mum would be the one to take care of the flowers, even though the establishment had multiple gardeners and caretakers. She would show Robert how something as simple as a flower needs special attention to truly bloom to its full potential. Jack would always frown at her for wasting the lad’s time when he could have been out on the farm learning the true grit of the real world. Robert rolls his eyes as he recalls the endless amount of farmland they had. It’s nice to have and to own but definitely too much too actually work on. 

He steps out of his Range Rover and walks up the steps of the mansion. Before he can knock, the butler opens the door. 

“Good afternoon Mr. Sugden.”

“Ah, as efficient as ever Doug.”

“Miss Victoria has been awaiting your arrival. She is in the kitchen.”

“Thanks. I’ll go and find her.”

Doug has been the butler for the house for quite some time. He was there throughout Robert’s teenage years and he has helped fix him up many times after his fights with Andy. He was always there at the right place at the right time and kept to himself. Robert knew he caused him a lot of trouble over the years but underneath, he was glad to have him there. 

Robert makes his way towards the kitchen where he finds Vic. She had her hair up in a ponytail and was dressed in a white blouse with dark blue polka dots and pair of blue jeans. She had an apron on and was carrying two empty plates. 

“Need some help?”

“Robert! You’re here!”

“Where else would I be?”

“I just thought you’d back out last minute.”

“And miss getting a taste of your fine culinary skills. No chance.”

“Well, I’m just finishing up setting up in the dining hall. Come on.”

Robert follow her into the grandiose room. The chandeliers that line the room are enormous. The large floor to ceiling windows make the room feel spacious and airy. This hall had been the place for many parties and gatherings which still occur from time to time for clients and business friends. Diane is very welcoming to guests and loves to have a good time with faces she hasn’t seen in a long time and Vic is more than happy to cater her creations for these events. 

“Sit down then,” Vic tells him as she takes off her apron. 

“Yes _mother_ ,” Robert jokes.

Vic sends him a look, “Diane will be here soon. In the meantime, you can tell me what’s been happening with you.”

“Oh no, better wait for Diane. She’ll be asking the same and I don’t want to repeat myself.”

Vic playfully puffs her cheeks and crosses her arms. “Unfair.”

“Come now Vic, none of that,” a voice calls out from across the room.

Diane walks in an elegant beige pantsuit, with a coral shirt underneath. She was a lovely sight and gave off an aura of kindness. 

“Robert, how long has it been?” she starts.

“Give or take a few months, life gets busy with a business.”

“I know, but do give us a call now and again.”

“I’ll try.”

Diane sits down across from Robert and Vic sits at the end of the long table. 

“Now will you tell us what’s been going on in your life?” Vic eagerly asks.

“Business is steady, not much else to go on about…. Except, Chrissie’s redoing the house now.”

“Again?” asks Diane.

“What’s the idea this time?” asks Vic. 

“Cubism, I think. Not too sure though.”

“Interesting choice. She always does such a lovely job, I just hope she doesn’t exert herself too much. What with work and redecorating. It takes a lot out of someone. Are you helping her out?” asks Diane.

Robert pauses, “It’s more her own personal project. Not much for me to do. Only get in her way if anything.”

“Oh Robert, you must at least have some opinion on the matter. It is afterall your home as well as hers!” exclaims Vic. 

“It’s kind of hard having an opinion when everything is already decided though is it,” he snaps. 

“Now Robert,” Diane starts.

Robert looks away, “Anyway, doesn’t matter now. She is on a spa break to get away from her stress.” 

Diane looks at him almost disapprovingly. “You two must cooperate together if you are going to last.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?,” Robert asks. 

“Nothing, except that you need to learn to communicate with each other better before something worse happens.”

“What, like another scandal you mean?”

“Robert, that’s not what I meant.”

“Rob, come on. Diane didn’t mean that,” Vic tells him softly.

Robert frowns and exhales a breath, “Ok, I’m sorry.”

“Alright, now let’s eat. Victoria’s been absolutely ecstatic about this new burger recipe,” Diane continues.

“Yes! I’ll get some now and be back in just a few. You will not believe how good they are.”

“Can’t wait,” Robert smiles.

Vic leaves the table to go to the kitchen leaving Diane and Robert alone. The silence is interrupted by a closing of a door and heavy footsteps coming in. Before Robert can turn his head he hears a voice call out.

“What’s he doing here?!”

“Andy, don’t be like that,” Diane tries to calm him.

Andy. Robert groans at his unfortunate luck. He really hoped he didn’t have to see him today. 

“Look Andy, I don’t have much time and I came here to spend some time with Vic before getting back to work.”

“And what work is that, huh? Talking people’s heads off until they buy into the crap your selling them?”

“Well, to be fair, it’s not crap as that’s more your department, dealing with fertilizer and all that,” Robert smirks. 

Andy lunges at Robert. He grabs him out of his seat and almost carries him to the nearest wall before he shoves him up against it. 

“Andy! Leave it!” yells Diane.

“You wouldn’t know the first thing about hard work. Dad always knew you could never hack it on a farm. Always doing anything to get out of the real family business, like the little weasel you are.”

Robert grabs at Andy’s hands and tries to pry them off himself. “Well, at least I’m actually earning profits. What about you? How much did you make when you lost that deal with the Richardsons?”

“You stole them!”

“No, I offered them a more beneficial option. One machine could do the job of five people.”

“Which put almost forty people out of work!”

“Look Andy, it’s not personal, it’s business.”

“Yeah, which is why you are a real son of a bitch.”

Robert glares at him and looks down. He pushes him away from himself and stands still for a moment. Andy stares back at him, ready for a fight. _I really don’t need this,_ Robert thinks. He goes around Andy and makes his way to leave. 

Vic comes back into the room, catching the tail end of all the drama. “Robert, where are you going?”, she asked sadly. 

“I’m sorry but I have to leave. I’ll see you later.”

“But what about the-”

“I’m sorry.”

Robert hurriedly makes his way for the door. His face in a frown and emotions all over the place he thinks, _I’m not a son of a bitch._ As he reaches the door, Doug has his hand on the knob but isn’t opening the door. Robert knows he’s trying to look over him to make sure he’s alright but Robert doesn’t need that right now.

“Doug, are you going to open that door or do I have to kick it down?!”

Doug wordlessly opens the door for Robert to exit. He quickly goes down the steps and goes to his Range Rover. He roughly opens the car door and climbs in. He shoves his keys into the ignition and starts up the car. In his angry haze, he speeds out of the place with a screech going down the driveway and out the gate. He hates that his time with his sister had to be ruined. As he drives down the road, he is able to calm down, even if it is only ever so slightly. He knows he will be no use at work like this so he pulls off the road and pulls out his phone to send Leyla a text saying he won’t be coming back in. After it has been sent, he sits back in his seat with his eyes closed and tries to take slow breaths. That’s when his phone starts to ring. He lets out an aggravated sigh before he looks at the screen and sees that it’s Aaron who’s calling him. He immediately taps to answer.

“Hey,” Robert says. 

“Yeah, just wanted to let you know that the car’s finished.”

Robert smiles. _Finally, some good news._ “Ok, I’ll be there in about an hour.”

“Fine, I’ll see you then. Bye.”

“Bye.”

Robert hangs up the phone. _This day can only get better from here._ He gets back on the road and quickly tries to get back to his redone car and the handyman that’s waiting for him. 

* * * * *

Aaron is sitting on the front steps of the house, taking in the beautiful view the place offered when he hears the sound of an engine rumbling. That’s when he sees the Range Rover pulling up on the driveway and parking just to the side of his car. Aaron gets up and dusts himself off from where he sat. He makes his way towards the car as Robert climbs out of the driver’s seat and shuts the door. He meets Aaron with a smile on his face. 

“Took you long enough,” Aaron starts.

“Well, you can’t rush perfection,” Robert retorts teasingly. 

“Oh really now?”

“Yeah,” Robert huffs out a laugh. “Same goes for the work on my car,” he says looking into Aaron’s eyes. 

Aaron stares back and feels his heart speed up. It’s as if Robert was implying that Aaron himself was a work of perfection. 

Aaron clears his throat, “Yeah, anyway the job’s all done if you wanna take a look.”

“Can’t wait.”

He brushes past Aaron as he walks towards the Audi, leaving Aaron flustered for a second. Aaron shakes his head and follows Robert to the car. 

Robert looks inside through the window, “You got the keys or is it open already?”

“It’s open,” Aaron says as he feels the keys in his pocket. 

Robert opens the car door and looks inside. His face scrunches up in a frown, _something’s off._ He looks closer at the driver’s seat when he finally sees what it is. _The color, the color’s off. This maroon color is- No. This is not what I wanted._

“Is everything ok?,” Aaron asks after a long moment of silence. He starts to nervously play with the strings of his hoodie, not knowing how to respond to this man’s silence. 

“Huh, why am I even amazed?,” Robert says incredulously. _This has just got to be the worst day._  
  
“Um, I don't know. Why are you amazed?,” Aaron asks, not liking Robert’s tone. 

“One would think you would know that car seats need to be a vibrant red if the car has a darker interior and not this dull maroon.”

“Well, if you wanted them in a _vibrant_ red color you should have asked for it,” Aaron snaps back, “but that's fine. I'll start all over. I just have to tell ya that's gonna more than double the price.”

“What do you mean?”  
  
“I've already used this leather, so…”

“I'm not paying for your mistake!” Robert all but screams at Aaron, letting all his frustrations come out. 

“Hey, I'm not just gonna-!”

Robert shakes his head and lifts his hands, “You know what? It doesn’t matter. You're fired!”  
  
Aaron looks at him with wide eyes. “You're unbelievable!,” Aaron shouts back. He just can’t believe that he actually thought that this guy is any different from all the other rich pricks. More so, he can’t believe he himself was so fooled.

“That's fine with me! Just pay me the money you owe me,” Aaron says back angrily. 

“The job was not done to my satisfaction!”  
  
“I got news for you, mate! No job will ever be done to your satisfaction!”  
  
“That's quite enough! Now, just get out!”

“No problem! Pay me the money you owe me and I'm gone!”

Robert ignores him and pushes him aside as he heads back towards the house.

“You know what your problem is? Huh?,” Aaron says.“You're so goddamn bored, you gotta invent things to bitch about. You haven't got a single thing to be happy about except for your hair,” Aaron says spitefully. “Yeah! The seats are just fine! You just needed somethin' to take up your useless, empty, rich-son-of-a-bitch days!

Robert stopped abruptly at that. He slowly turned back around to face Aaron. He glared at him with a fierceness in his eyes and maybe just a little bit of hurt. He couldn’t believe what Aaron had just called him. He didn’t care about anything anymore. He went straight for Aaron’s car. 

“Hey, where do you think you’re going?”

Robert grabs the tool box laying by the trunk and lifts it effortlessly. He starts to run towards the nearest fence. Aaron is left standing there confused until he sees that over that fence there is nothing but lake water. That’s when it hits him what Robert was planning to do. 

“No not my tools!,” Aaron shouts as he starts to chase after him.

As Robert reaches the fence, he looks back and sees Aaron coming after him. He raises the tool box and throws it over the fence towards the center of the lake, scattering the tools as the box tumbles in the air. Robert stands back before he is tackled to the ground. Robert’s flat out on his back as Aaron climbs over him, pinning him down with his thighs.

“You're dead meat! You got that?,” Aaron screams as he pulls Robert up by his shirt with his fist.  
  
Robert huffs, wind knocked out of him, “Is that what you think?....I'm not bored! I'm quite happy! Everyone wants to be me!”  
  
Aaron leans closer, “You’ll pay for this,” he says menacingly.

He lets go of Robert letting his head fall back down on the ground with a thud. He climbs off Robert and walks back to his car. Robert continues to lay there until he hears the car drive away with a man inside that got the brunt of Robert’s frustrations. After a few minutes pass, he still doesn’t get up. He thinks back to earlier today, the words echoing in his head. _Which is why you are a real son of a bitch,_ he winces. _Somethin' to take up your useless, empty, rich-son-of-a-bitch days!,_ he shuts his eyes. His body lets out a shudder as he feels everything around him just pile on top of each other. He hates that he is that affected by just a few words but right now he can’t care. All he wants is for this day to be over. 

* * * * *

Aaron was livid. His mind was going over what happened and he couldn’t understand how things could have gotten so out of hand. Everything was fine one second and then chaos the next. _What could have caused that stupid businessman to behave like a spoiled brat? Was the color so bad he had to tear my head off?!_ Aaron thought. His hands gripped the steering wheel a little tighter at the thought. He was on his way back to Emmerdale because there was no need to go back to his office in Hotten as he didn’t have any tools to return. _Fuck! Now I gotta scrounge some stuff off Cain if I’m still gonna get any work done._ Aaron shakes his head and exhales. 

He finally gets to the village and heads straight into the pub, needing a drink after the day he’s had. The pub was quiet, filled with some regulars and a family or two enjoying their lunches. Chas was at the pub serving someone when she noticed Aaron come in. She was about to call him over before she saw his face and stopped herself. He’s glad for that as he doesn’t have it in him to get into it. 

“Pint please.”

“Sure.”

After a long pause Chas starts, “You alright?”

“Yeah, just bad day at work. Had to deal with a real dickhead.”

“Yeah, had a few back in my day as well. You’ll feel better after you’ve had some rest and then you’ll have forgotten all about this dickhead.” Chas smiles at him.

Aaron huffs, “ Yeah, thanks.”

As he was finishing up his pint, Adam walks in and spots him. He pats him on the back as he reaches the bar.

“Haven’t seen you in ages, mate! I’ll get us a seat and we can talk,” Adam starts.

Aaron gets up and finishes the rest of his pint. 

“Get us a pint please Chas,” Adam says in his cheery voice. 

“Sure, I’ll bring them over.”

Aaron and Adam head towards a booth to the side and sit down. Chas comes over and sets their drinks down. After they get settled in, Adam looms over at Aaron. 

“Now, you gonna tell me what’s eating at ya or do I have to force it out of ya?,” Adam asks.

Aaron stays silent and just sends Adam a look. 

“Oh come on! I just wanna make sure you’re okay. Your gloomy face is just depressing.”

Aaron huffs out a laugh.

“See, now come on out with it.”

Aaron sighs, “You know that client I had with the seat covers?”

“Yeah, Mr. Moneybags. He had you going over to his right?”

“Yep. Finished the job and did a damn good one too. Everything was good up until he decided to pitch a fit over the color!,” Aaron said, his tone turning to anger at the mere remembrance of it. 

“Over the color? Why? Did you get him cow print seats?,” Adam joked.

“No! He said red so I got him red!”

“Uhh, I don’t see the problem?”

“Ohh, but didn’t you know that car seats need to be a _vibrant_ red if the car has a _darker_ interior and not the dull shit that I had in there!,” Aaron said sarcastically, imitating Robert’s tone as he said it.

“Mate, what an asshole!”

“I know right. But it didn’t end there,” Aaron looked down and then whispered, “He didn’t even pay me.”

“That’s not right. You did a job and you need to get paid for it, screw whether he liked it or not!”

“Well, he didn’t see it that way.” Then Aaron went quiet again.

“What, so you just left it at that?”

“No…,” Aaron said reluctantly. 

“So, what’d you do?”

“Well, I went off on him! What’d ya think?! He was just gonna leave me there empty handed so I-,” Aaron stops.

“What?!”

“.....called him all sorts didn’t I.”

Adam just starts laughing. “Really, that’s it? That’s not the Aaron i know.”

“Yeah but I regret doing that now.”

“Really?! Why?”

“Because that crazy asshole took my tools and threw them in a fucking lake!”

Adam starts up again. “Oh, that sucks. Man, that really sucks,” he says as he’s trying to stifle his laughter.

Aaron puts his hands into his pockets and feels a set of keys. _Shit! I forgot about these._ “Well, I at least have these,” he says as he pulls out the keys to show to Adam.

“Not like that is worth much without the car attached,” Adam jokes. “Don’t even bother with them. If he’s that rich, he can just order some new ones.”

“I guess you’re right. Ugh, I’m screwed,” Aaron says in despair. “Unless I can get Cain to lend me some tools, I’m out of business.”

“Awww, don’t say that. I’m sure he’ll help out. I mean after he’s ripped your head off.” 

Aaron groans. 

“Don’t be like that. Come on. Maybe it’s like fate or something?,” Adam says with an odd optimism in his voice. 

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I was thinking, Mom’s finally got some extra help for the farm which leaves me with more time on my hands. I mean, I’ve been thinking, maybe you and me, we can go into business together. What’d you think?”

“What kind of business?”

“I don’t really know.”

“Oh, great business plan,” Aaron jokes.

“I’m working on it! Could always open something up here, something that keeps us busy but still keeps us close to home, you know?”

“Yeah, be great and all but there’s not much out there that fits that.”

“Maybe something like scrappin’? We had this guy come on the farm to get rid of an old grainer we had and we got to talking. Seems like there is a good market for that sorta stuff.”

“Huh, not bad. But where are we gonna get the money?”

“Aww, why’d you go and spoil it,” Adam pouts.

Aaron just laughs, “All we can do now is dream. Not much else for it.”

“What about a sponsor? You got some contacts, right?”

“Maybe, I got a few. But that would take a proper business plan and everything. Otherwise, there’s no hope in hell of us getting anything”

“Oh come on, two aspiring young lads, trying to make a name for themselves in this world. Who can refuse that?,” Adam says teasingly. 

Aaron huffs and sips at his drink. They talk about nonsense for the rest of the night and it helps Aaron feel a bit better. As the pub was closing up, they said their goodbyes and Aaron went into the back towards his room. Lying in bed, his thoughts begin to consume him once more. All he can think about is what the hell he’s gonna do now.

* * * * *

Robert made it back into the house just as the sun was starting to set. His clothes were a mess, covered in dirt and grass, so he went straight upstairs to take a shower and get changed. Afterwards, he headed back downstairs, feeling a bit more human and yet there was still this weighing feeling on his chest. _Useless. Empty. Whatever!_ he thinks to himself. He sighs before he moves towards the kitchen. Robert decides that fixing himself a drink should help him feel better as it usually did. That’s when he here’s the front door open. 

“Hello! I’m back and if I’m not tired I don’t know what I am,” Chrissie says as she enters.

Robert sets his drink down and moves towards the entrance. 

“What’s wrong with you? Are you not happy to see me?,” Chrissie asks. 

“No, just had a bad day. Glad you’re home.”

“Well, I’ve got something that’ll cheer you up but it’ll have to wait til tomorrow since it’s out in the car and I refuse to do even one single thing until I’ve had some wine and a smile from my fiance,” she said sweetly. 

All Robert could do is smile half-heartedly but she seemed fine with that as she smiled back at him and headed towards the kitchen for a glass of wine. 

“I’m going to be watching the top ten flats across the world if you want to join me,” she says.

Robert thinks of how he doesn’t really feel like spending the rest of his night wallowing in misery and he loves seeing a good renovation. This’ll be something mindless that’ll occupy him and also give him a chance to spend some time with his fiance. _See, I have everything a man could wish for. I’m rich, engaged to a beautiful woman,_ Robert thinks, _and yet..._ but he shakes that last thought out of his head before it goes anywhere. 

“Sure, thing. I’ll be right there. Just gotta check on something.”

Robert leaves Chrissie to herself while he goes back outside. Something inside of him feels unsettled by the fact things just didn’t go well with this job. He looks at the Audi with a scowl on his face. If only he that stupid handyman knew how colors worked, then maybe he wouldn’t be feeling this bad about what that idiot had called him. He walks over to the Audi and goes for the car handle to open it. It wouldn’t budge. He groans as he heads back inside to look for the keys. 

He looked at the table in the foyer, in the kitchen. Nothing. He searched all the counters and tabletops. Still nothing. He’s thinks he’s about to go crazy before he remembers that Aaron last had them. _Did he ever hand them over?_ He thinks back and Aaron never really did give him back the keys. _Fuck! He still has them! Is this some silly revenge for the tools?! If he thinks that he’ll get away with this he’s sorely mistaken!_ Robert heads upstairs and grabs the keys for the Range Rover from his pile of discarded clothes and runs back downstairs. He is putting on a jacket when Chrissie comes into the hallway.

“Robert, you coming?,” Chrissie asks.

“Uhh, no. I’ve actually just remembered. I’ve got to go to Hotten and take care of some business with that Dingle handyman,” Robert answers back. 

“Ok then,” Chrissie says as she goes back and focuses on the program. 

Robert is out the door and in his Range Rover within seconds. He turns the keys roughly and screeches out of the driveway. With the daylight gone, the road is consumed by the evening darkness. Any visibility of the roads comes from the headlights of the car as they illuminate the road ahead. As he tries to focus on the road before him, Robert’s anger pumps throughout his veins. His thoughts race through his mind as he thinks of what he will say when he faces that handyman. _I’ll make sure he regrets ever thinking of wronging me again._ He’s already over halfway there when he hears a clunking sound and then a sputter. 

“No, no no NO!,” Robert screams as he hits the outer steering wheel with the palms of his hands. 

He quickly pulls over to the side of the road. He leaves the keys in the ignition and steps out to inspect what exactly went wrong with a car that was working perfectly fine this morning. Robert goes to pull out his phone and as he reaches into his pocket, he can only feel the fabric against his leg. He tries the other side and it is the same as the other. Robert just closes his eyes and raises his head up towards the sky. He was just so done with today. He looks back down at the Range Rover. Thinking that there is not much he can do here, he starts to just walk down the road hoping to reach Hotten by foot. After walking for ten minutes, he is starting to get tired. Irritated and tired. He starts to shout out into the air.

“This is _just_ GREAT!” 

A slight hum of a vehicle approaching comes up behind Robert but his own voice drowns out the sound. 

“What did I do to deserve this?! Hmmm?! I don’t have my phone! I don’t have a way to get back home because my car is all fucked up! My stupid brother blames me for his own mistakes! And that stupid handyman just added the cherry on the top now, didn’t he?! My day has just been absolute sh-”

He pauses when he hears that there is something right behind him. He barely looks over his shoulder when he sees two bright lights heading straight towards him. His mouth drops and shock takes over his entire body. It’s too close. He can’t move out of the way. His body tries to brace itself as he hears the loud honk echoing through his ears. 

And then everything went black.


	2. Everything Forgotten

As the days passed, Aaron was able to get back to some form of normality. Cain said he would lend him some tools whenever he needed them but that he better bring them back the same day he got them. Chas was busy minding the pub and Liv was helping clear away the tables. Business was slow and all seemed well in the moment. It was Aaron’s day off and he was gonna make sure to enjoy it. What happened that one day still bothered him and he knew that it shouldn’t. He should just forget about it since there was nothing he could do about the tools or the money. Aaron is sitting in the living room at the table, enjoying some breakfast whilst watching some TV and as he’s about to take another bite, Adam busts in the door.

“Aaron, mate! You and me are going out tonight and I’m not taking no for an answer.”

Trying not to choke on his food, Aaron gulps down hard and sends Adam a stern look. He knows Adam is just trying to get him out of the recent rut he’s been in. He’s even suggested to go over to Mr.Moneybags’ house and ask him “nicely” to hand over the money he owes. Thankfully Aaron got him to drop that idea before he actually went ahead with it. 

Aaron groans, “Adam, I really don’t feel like it right now.”

“Well, that’s right now but tonight you will be out there having fun!”

“You really aren’t gonna let this go?”

“Come on, you’re talking to me,” Adam says as he gestures to himself with both hands. 

“Uh, maybe. That’s my answer.”

“That’s better than a no!,” Adam says cheerfully. 

Aaron shakes his head at his friend and goes back to his breakfast. Adam takes a seat on the couch and watches what’s happening on TV.

_“-and this just in, there has been a report of a found person who seems to be suffering from a case of amnesia. Police report that an anonymous call informed them that a man was found unconscious and upon further investigation, police found no identification on his person or within a surrounding five mile radius of the area where the man was found. Police also stated that there were some abrupt tire tracks found at the side of the road about a mile from where the man was found but there are no leads to show where the vehicle might be located or if it is even connected with this found person. Police brought him to the local hospital in the Hotten area where medical experts reported that the man was stable in his unconscious state and no serious injuries were discovered. The man remained unconscious for a week before he woke up. After several questions, the medical staff confirmed the man has no recollection of who he is or any previous memories.”_

Adam whistles, “Poor guy, can’t remember anything about himself. Wonder if anyone’s looking for him.”

This makes Aaron look up at the TV, curious about this bit of local news.

_“This is a picture of the man that was found on the side of the road just outside of Hotten.”_

The news reporter gestures to the left where an image of the person pops up. Aaron couldn’t believe his eyes. _That’s Robert Sugden._

“That’s him!,” Aaron exclaims as he gets out of his chair at the table and gets in front of the TV. 

“Who?”

“The dickhead!”

_“If anybody recognizes this man, please contact the Hotten Hospital center. The hospital says that any tips on this man’s identity would be greatly appreciated.”_

“I can’t believe nobody’s come to get him yet,” Adam marvels, “I mean you’d think-”

“Course nobody’d be there. It’s their shot at freedom.”

“Hey, we should go see if we can get your money back.”

“He doesn’t know who he is. Do you think he’s gonna know who I am?,” Aaron says dejectedly. 

Then there’s a pause before Aaron’s eyes widen as an idea forms in his head. A really, really good idea. He turns back to face Adam.

“Adam,” Aaron says as he chuckles.

“What?”

Aaron sends him a look and Adam just shakes his head.

“Oh mate, no. This is illegal! You’re crazy!”

“Oh come on Adam. He’s been in there for over a week, don’t you think that someone in his life would have got to him by now?! Please. I have him stay here so that he can repay me for the tools he threw away and for the money I wasted on his stupid car seats and then he’ll go back to where he came from. See no harm done.”

“What do you mean by repaying you?”

“Well he can help out around the pub. My mum could use the help and at no cost she’ll have no reason to say no.”

“Ha! She will if it’s a complete stranger who says he’ll work for free! Have fun convincing Chas to take that on. No way.”

Aaron pauses. Adam’s right. Chas wouldn’t trust someone like that at her pub. But- “Well, she’ll believe it if I tell her it’s my boyfriend who… recently suffered from amnesia and... is moving in with me for a few weeks until he settles back into regular life. Sounds good, right?” He smirks at Adam. 

Adam just stares at him. 

“Boyfriend? Aaron, you haven’t had time for a night out, let alone a boyfriend. She will never believe ya.”

“What do you mean? I’ve been seeing him for the past two weeks.”

“Aaron, no.”

“I’ll say I met him a while back and got with him through texts and stuff and being the understanding boyfriend that he is, he knows that I work all the time and can’t be with him all the time. Cover story done. Come on, Adam. That asshole left me hanging high and dry. This is the least he can do.”

“What about Liv? She’ll suss you out the moment you even try to convince her he’s your boyfriend.”

“Guess you’re right about that. Then I’ll just tell her about him and that he’s here for a little bit until we’re even. She’ll go along with it. 

“How do you know?”

“Simple, she won’t have to help out in the pub if he’s there.”

“Ahh, I see your point. But what about the hospital?”

“I’ll think of something on the way there. Come on Adam, say you’ll help?”

Aaron just looks expectantly at him. Adam can do nothing but sigh.

“Fine! I’ll help you.”

“Great! I’m gonna head on over to the hospital now. Can you see if you have any old clothes left up at the farm? ”

“Sure, why?”

“Well, I can hardly have him living here with no clothes and I definitely don’t have enough for two.”

“….Man I don’t know how you talk me into these things.”

Aaron laughs, “It’ll be over before you know it.”

Aaron heads back upstairs to get dressed up. It’s almost ironic how everything played out. This guy thought he was absolutely invincible with all his money he had, but now, he was a nobody without it. He revels in the thought that this is how the dickhead will receive his justice. _Huh, funny how life turns out,_ Aaron thinks. He’s got a good feeling that everything’s taken a turn for the better. 

* * * * *

Aaron arrives at the hospital shortly after his conversation with Adam. He steps out of his car and looks at himself in the car’s window reflection. He adjusts his suit jacket just a little and makes sure nothing was on it. Aaron was not one to wear suits except for certain occasions but if he was going to pull this off, he needed to look the part. The part of someone who’s about to pick up their loved one. 

He walks into the hospital and looks for the service desk. He found it just ahead of him and noticed that only one person was there, an older lady who seemed to be pointing someone to the left and smiling at them as they left. _Well, here goes nothing,_ Aaron thinks as he goes up to the lady.

“Hiya sweetheart, what can I help you with?,” the lady kindly asks.

“Um, I’m here about the bloke that was found. I-” Aaron hesitates, “I’m here for Robert.”

The lady’s eyes widen. “Oh, well that’s great! Glad to see that he finally had somebody come for him,” she eagerly says. “So what relation are you to him? Because this lad is going to need a lot of care from his wife and family.”

 _Shit!_ Aaron completely forgot that the guy was married! How did the nurse even now? The ring! Of course Robert would have been wearing the ring when he was brought into the hospital. He can’t tell them that he’s his boyfriend now. That won’t work. Aaron starts to panic slightly. _No, I can’t back down now._ Aaron thinks and finds the only lie that fits. 

“Uhmm, actually,” Aaron goes a bit quieter as he leans on the counter slightly, “he’s my husband.”

The older lady looks back at him and it takes a moment before it clicks. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I- I just assumed.” She flusters for a bit.

Aaron just stands there hoping his attempt at a smile with his lips closed seemed believable. 

“Well, then no time like the present. Let’s get you to that hubby of yours,” the lady says sweetly. 

“Yes let’s.”

“First off, I’ll give you what they found on him and then you can go and visit him,” she says as she’s turning around to go into a back room. She comes back out with a small box filled with clothes and some items on top.

“Here we have some of his clothes he was wearing. We also have this watch that seemed to be inside the jacket when he was found, his ring, and his shoes. That’s all he had.”

Aaron takes a look at all the stuff before him. He takes an extra glance at the watch and looks over it once more.

“I’ve got to say, Robert was my third choice for his name,” she says.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, the watch, R.J.S. I thought it would be something like Ryan or Richard.”

Aaron looks at the back and notices the inscription on the watch. It was written in a simple cursive font. He held it in his hand and admired it. 

The lady was clacking away at here computer before she spoke, “Alrighty!”

Aaron slightly startled by her, shoved his hand along with the watch in his own suit pocket. 

“He’ll be just down that hall and fourth room to the right. I’ll let the doctor know so she’ll be there shortly.”

“Thanks,” Aaron says as he starts to turn. 

“You’re welcome, sweetie. Just glad you got here finally.”

Aaron stops as he feels a need to explain, something to make this whole situation believable. “Yeah well, I only just saw it on the news.”

“Oh? Is that so? You must be local then?”

“Yeah, uh, just from Emmerdale.”

“Oh that’s not too far.”

“Glad _he_ didn’t go too far,” Aaron laughs in relief. “I was worried out of my mind for the last few days,” Aaron said emphasizing the last bit. 

“Oh goodness! Well, don’t you worry. We took good care of him and he’s alright now. Just a bit scrambled at the moment. A few days back at home and he’ll be right as rain,” she said enthusiastically. 

“Right, thanks.”

Aaron heads in the direction she showed him with the box of items in his hands. He stops in front of the room and looks through the window blinds and sees Robert and someone in a nurse’s outfit talking to him. That’s when it dawned on him. He doesn’t know what to do from here. How is he supposed to convince Robert to go with him? He’s all caught up in his thoughts when he hears a loud clatter from the room. 

“What do you mean I’m doing just FINE?! I don’t know my name, where I am, or why imbeciles like you think that saying that I’m doing just fine is going to make any of this better!,” Aaron hears Robert shout. 

“Sir, as I’ve said before amnesia is quite unpredictable. Your memories can come back within days or within months. No one knows quite for sure. If you go back to familiar surroundings, there is a chance they will come back much quicker. As for your physical health, sir, you are stable and there seem to be no abnormalities, so you are indeed ‘fine’, alright?,” the other man says. 

Aaron feels a tap on his shoulder and jumps back. He sees that it must be the doctor, at least judging by her name tag. 

“And you must be here for ‘Robert’ I’m assuming?,” she asks.

“Uhh, yes.”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you. Although he’s doing a pretty good job in there himself,” She jokes, “Let’s go on in Mr.-”

“Aaron.”

The doctor satisfied, opens the door and steps in with Aaron following behind her. The room was like any other hospital room except for a few bits and pieces thrown around, obviously someone’s not happy. Robert is in a hospital gown in a sitting position on the hospital bed with the cover over his lower half. His hands are in fists as they clench in front of him. Aaron looks at the guy who seems to be Robert’s nurse who is trying to calm him down and appears to be helpless in doing so. Robert suddenly turns his head towards the intrusion.

“Finally!,” Robert says as he is throwing off the covers and moving to get off the bed, “Doctor is there any way that I can be transferred to another room where I don’t have to deal with this guy and his consistent lack of a bedside manner?!”

“Okay. Let’s all just calm down for a second. I have some good news for you.”

“What?”

“Well, Robert-,” his eyes widen at the sound of the name, “it seems someone’s here to take you home.”

Robert sits back down on the edge of his bed and looks down confused. That name, it sounds right. Nothing extra, nothing less, the name just fits in his brain. He feels like that is his name, no, he _knows_ that it’s his name. He smiles widely as he looks back up at the doctor and gets up.

“That’s my name!,” Robert raises his hands to himself, “How did you-”

The doctor steps to the side and Aaron comes around from behind her. He looks at Robert nervously.

“Actually, it was thanks to this lovely man here,” the doctor says as she gestures her hand towards Aaron. 

Aaron knows that this is the point where he makes it or breaks it. _Showtime,_ he thinks. 

“Robert!,” Aaron says in a cheerful tone. 

Robert just stands there, as if he is expecting something else. He looks closer at Aaron trying to see if he can make any connection.

“I don’t recognize this man.”

The doctor looks over towards Aaron with pity, “Your husband's had an almost total loss of memory.”

“I-I can't believe he doesn't know his own husband!,” exclaimed Aaron. 

Robert is shook. He’s married to a _man_ . No, it can’t be. He feels it inside himself that this is not right. _Him, married? To a man?_ Before his thoughts confuse him further, he decides to stick to his gut feeling. 

“This missing-link person is not my husband!”  
  
Aaron knew this would be tough so he had to play him hard, “Oh, Robert, please!” Aaron takes a deep breath, “I can’t believe he doesn’t remember me. Everything’s gonna be OK. Now.... I _am_ your husband. My name is Aaron Dingle.” He pauses. “We've been married for a while now.”   
  
“Wait!,” Robert says as he holds his hands out as though to stop the distance between them from getting any shorter, “I admit I have forgotten numerous things but I truly, from the depths of my soul, do not remember you!” He stares blankly back at Aaron as he grows more unsettled at the thought that this complete stranger is claiming something so ridiculous. He turns towards the medical staff. “Don't you think there'd be some spark of recognition?,” he pleads.

“We don't know,” the doctor replies.

This was going downhill. Aaron needed to do something fast. He quickly walks up to Robert and grabs at his neck, “Maybe you'll spark to this!” Before Robert could even register what was going on, he found his lips being taken by a rough kiss and his face scratched by the short hairs of a beard. There was more surprise and shock than a spark but Robert could feel something inside him getting heated. Before Robert could dwell on that feeling, Aaron lets him go and looks at his eyes with a confidence that further confused Robert. _This man is looking at me so… smug. Like he is getting one over on me. Does he really think he can just- Arghh! How in the world could this man ever be my husband?_

“Ugh! I don't believe this!,” Robert says in disgust, “He could be some stranger off the street!

The nurse chimes in, “Well, he seems to like you and he's a nice guy.”

“He's good-lookin',” the doctor backs him up, “Clean. You know, nice.”

“No, I don't know!” Robert screams, infuriated by their responses. “I don't know any of this, and I don't know you!,” Robert says as he points at Aaron. He feels as though he’s being cornered and grasps at anything that can make sense. “I need some proof!”

The doctors share a look and Aaron turns to look between them and Robert. 

“Look, if it were up to us, we'd be glad to give him to you, but he's right,” the nurse says to Aaron. 

The doctor nods her head, “I'm gonna need some verification.”

Seeing as they seem adamant to believe that this man is his husband but can’t do so without something, and Robert’s decided he needs evidence, Aaron thinks of the only way he can prove that this man is indeed his husband.

“Oh, listen... I know what you mean. I understand. Now… I don't like to talk about this in public, and I've never told anybody... But he does have a small heart-shaped birthmark, uh…,” he blushes as he motions towards his back. “It's kinda high up on his... right cheek and it's unique.”

All Robert can do is look at the man incredulously. He laughs to himself but then he looks at the people around him. They’re all staring back at him as if they’re expecting something. He’s almost about to argue this outrageous method of verification but then his own curiosity of knowing whether there is some truth to the nonsense this stranger was spouting wins over any logic he might have had in his mind. He walks behind the curtain area and tugs it to cover most of his body. He then contorts his body and moves the hospital gown out of the way to look at his ass. And there it was. A small yet distinctive heart. 

After a moment of silence, Aaron looks towards the curtain and sees Robert’s head pop out and look straight into Aaron’s eyes in disbelief and in that moment, all Aaron can do is spread his arms as he triumphantly says, “Come here, Hubby!”

* * * * *

Robert is sitting in the front seat of a stranger’s car, next to a stranger, heading towards a strange place. He can’t help but think this is how horror movies usually begin and he very much so doesn’t want to be the next victim of an unfortunate accident, although he sort of already is. Having nothing but a blank space for his past makes him feel vulnerable, pathetic even, and to have to depend on someone who he does not know or trust really leaves him helpless. But the only thing he can do now is question every part of this so-called reality until something actually makes sense. He looks over to the driver’s side and focuses in on ‘Aaron’. What he doesn’t understand is how in the world he got here now.

“Why was I found in the middle of nowhere?”

Aaron, surprised to finally hear Robert speak to him, thinks of a reason. “Well, you enjoy going on long walks.”

“Long walks,” Robert repeats trying to piece what he can of his life, “Fine, then why was I all the way in Hotten?”

Aaron, surprised that Robert is actually talking to him, tries to conjure up some reason that would explain why he was out there because even he doesn't know why Robert was out on that stretch of road. “Well, you go where the path takes you. Sometimes, I don’t see you for days and then you come back at the most random times.”

Robert just squints his eyes as he looks at Aaron. 

“How did we-?,” Robert begins to ask but then trails off.

“What?”

“How did we get together?”

Aaron thinks for a moment before he decides nothing is easier than the truth in this case. “We met while I was doing a job. You were actually quite the charmer in the beginning. Asked if I wanted a drink back at yours and then before I knew it, you were taking your shirt off. And the rest is history,” Aaron says with a smile hoping he’ll accept this somewhat twisted versions of actual events because he really had nothing else to fall back on. _It REALLY is what happened…..more or less._

Robert looks down into his lap. “Huh, how cliche,” he says as if he’s disappointed. 

The car falls silent once more except for the low hum of the engine. Aaron can see that they are almost back to Emmerdale by the looks of the road. 

“So, what about our rings?,” Robert asks interrupting the silence. 

_The rings!_ Aaron didn’t even think about that. Telling the hospital that Robert was his husband was not really part of his plan. It just sorta happened in the moment. 

“Umm, well you see. We are married, just-,” Aaron’s mind is racing, “uhh, my family doesn’t know,” he lies.

“What do you mean?

“It’s uhh, something we _both_ thought was a good idea, not telling them since we just didn’t have the money for it,” Aaron said, trying to put a little truth into his lies. “My family would want to make it a big thing and we just thought that until we’ve saved up enough, we’d keep our marriage to ourselves for now.”

Seeing Robert’s face of disbelief, Aaron adds, “I mean _you_ thought it was better to keep it quiet until we were ready to have a proper wedding and all. You bought us our rings.” 

“Where’s yours then?”

 _Shit!_ Aaron didn’t think about that. “Uhh, well, I lost it working,” Aaron spins, “I hate that it happened,” Aaron looks over to see if he’s convincing enough but Robert is still not buying it. So Aaron invents a better lie, “and I know you told me to be more careful at work but it’s just one of those things where something just happens. Anyway, we planned to get new ones for our official wedding.”

Robert seems to understand when he nods his head.

“So my mum, Chas, doesn’t know were married which is why she will still think we’re boyfriends,” Aaron adds.

“Right.”

Robert sits back in his seat as he processes all this information. _Crazy family. Secret marriage. What’s gonna surprise me next?!_ Robert thought sarcastically. 

“We’re here,” Aaron says as he drives by the Emmerdale sign.

Robert looks out his window and sees the village. Everything looked so quiet, it seemed to be like any other small village. People milling about, old women chatting the latest gossip, and kids playing at the bus stop. _This, this can’t be right._ Robert could just feel something inside of him screaming that his life is not meant to be subjected to this boring village. He sees Aaron pulling up to what looks like a pub. _The Woolpack._ He just looks back at Aaron in horror. 

“I should probably go in and tell mum you’re here,” Aaron starts.

“We live in a pub?!”

“Yeah,” Aaron says. But Robert is still shocked at the fact. “You moved in with me, uhh, after the lease on your place was up,” Aaron added and then thought of how to seal the deal, “And, you worked at a pub for so long that it didn’t bother you to live in one.” Aaron flashes a somewhat convincing grin towards Robert. 

Robert slowly begins to go back into a neutral state. _Bar work? Me?_ Robert just sighs as this is just another fact of life from now on. He is just some lowly pub worker in a dull place attached to a complete stranger. 

“Right, uh, you stay here while I tell everyone about what happened to you. Wouldn’t want them to overwhelm you,” Aaron says casually.

Robert nods, not giving a Aaron a response. 

Aaron gets out of the car and goes into the pub from the back entrance. He sees Chas up at the bar. The place is quiet since the lunch rush hasn’t come in just yet and so, it was the perfect time for Aaron to tell Chas the ‘wonderful news’. 

“Hiya mum.”

“Oh hey. Came here to help your mum out?,” she asks encouragingly. 

Aaron laughs, “Not quite. Actually, I kinda need _your_ help.”

“What for?”

“Well,” Aaron pauses to take a breath. He doesn’t want to lie to her but if he tells her the real reason he has Robert here, she’ll flip. “The thing is, I have someone that needs to stay here for a week. Maybe more.”

“Who is it?

“....It’s my boyfriend.”

Chas’s eyes widen. “Your boyfriend! Oh honey,” Chas wraps her arms around Aaron, “I’m so happy for you.” 

“Thanks,” Aaron says as he wriggles out of her grasp. 

“And of course he can stay here. Does he need anything?”

“There’s something else,” Aaron looks up at her.

“What is it?”

“He’s just got outta hospital and they said that he- he’s got amnesia.”

“Gosh is he okay?”

“He’s fine physically, but not up here,” Aaron points to his head. “He knows what everything is around him but when it comes to himself and his memories, he can’t seem to remember a thing.”

“That’s horrible. Did the doctors say when he will get his memories back.”

“Could take days, weeks, no one knows. But they said to put him in a familiar surrounding for the time being to help him readjust and maybe that will help him regain his memories quicker.”

“But wouldn’t it be better for him to be home?”

“He could, it’s just-,” Aaron tries to think of something that’ll stick, “he lives alone and doesn’t have anyone else to look after him.”

“Poor guy,” Chas says. “Yeah, of course, it’s a no brainer. He’ll stay here with us while he gets better.”

“Thanks mum,” Aaron says before he remembers, “Oh, and I have one more thing.” _Robert needs to earn his keep somehow,_ Aaron devilishly thought. “He actually worked at a bar not too long ago. Maybe he can take a few shifts and chores at the pub to help him get back into a routine?”

“I’m sorry, I would but I don’t have the money to pay him to do that.”

“Don’t worry. He won’t need paying. He’ll appreciate anything to help him remember.”

“Well, in that case, I can’t refuse the help. Go on then. Get that mystery man in here.”

“He’s out in the car. I’ll be right back.”

Aaron goes back out to see Robert leaning against the car with his hand in his jacket pockets. He was wearing the clothes that the hospital had in the box for him. Aaron would be lying if he said that Robert didn’t look great in that outfit and the way he was angling his hips off the car definitely weren’t making Aaron stare at him just that little bit more. Robert sees Aaron and gets off the car and walks towards him. 

“So…,” Robert starts.

Aaron clears his throat. “Yeah, mum took it pretty well now that she knows what happened to ya and it’s all good. She even agreed to get you some shifts at the pub hoping it might help spark something. She can’t wait to see ya.”

Robert sighs and just rolls his eyes. “Let’s just get it over with” he says as he walks past Aaron into the pub. 

Aaron narrows his eyes as he looks at Robert. _Guess being an asshole is just ingrained into this guy,_ he thinks as he follows Robert in. Aaron’s about to tell him off but then he bumps into the back of Robert as he just stopped in the middle of the room. Aaron comes around him and he has to stifle a laugh when he sees the look on Robert’s face. It was a mixture of disappointment and despair at what he finds to be his place of living. Robert justs stands there immobile.

Aaron decides to rub that feeling into him and says, “Well, home sweet home. Right Robert?”

“Is this really where we live?,” Robert says in a weak voice as he continues to take in the surroundings of the pub’s backroom. It had a cozy atmosphere yet a somewhat dated feel to it. The couch had worn pillows on it and the kitchen table had scratches, both from extensive use. The shelves were filled with photos and knick knacks that had gathered a thick layer of dust. There is no way he could possibly ever live in this hole willingly. It just wasn’t right to him. 

“Yup,” Aaron says as he patted him on the back, “now come on. We don’t want to keep her waiting.”

Robert slowly begins to move but the grimace on his face continues. Aaron leads the way into the bar where Chas is stood there, grinning like a mad woman. 

“Mum, this is Robert,” Aaron says as he pushes Robert forward. 

Robert nearly stumbles before he steadies himself. Aaron continues, “And this is Chas, my mum.”

Robert remains silent for a beat before his basic manners kick in, “Um, hi.”

“Are you sure you’re feeling alright?,” Chas asked worriedly. 

“I’m fine...I think.”

Chas just smiles and says, “I know this must be hard for you but it’ll take time. It’ll be a process to remember stuff but don’t you worry. We’ll be right there with ya. You go ahead and get settled in and if you need anything, make sure to let us know and if-” 

Aaron clears his throat in some warning, trying to get his mum to back off just a bit seeing as Robert seemed to be getting more confused by the second. 

“Oh, right,” Chas says, “I’ll leave you be…..but just so you know, you’re really lucky to have Aaron here looking out for you like this,” she ends with a smile before she turns back around to tend to the bar. 

Robert looks over at Aaron. He knows he should be grateful that he does have someone at his side but he can’t understand why he doesn’t feel anything from that. _Shouldn’t I at least feel something, being here?,_ Robert can’t help but be tortured by his thoughts. They share a look where Robert can only hope to find some shred of this man’s existence in his life somewhere in his brain but he still comes up with nothing. Aaron disregards him as he nods in the direction from where they came as if telling Robert to follow him. 

As they go back into the backroom, Robert sits down on the couch. Even if it has seen better days, it was still comfortable enough to rest on for a few minutes. Aaron pulls out a chair from the table and sits opposite of him. Just as Aaron is about to say something, the door goes as someone walks in.

“Hey,” Aaron says.

Robert turns around, curious to see if someone he might remember walked in. Before him stood a young girl, most likely in her teens, carrying a bag that seemed to be quite full of stuff. She seemed to have a few strands of straw in her long blonde hair that was up in a ponytail, some dust over her jacket, and a scowl on her face as she stared back at him. 

“That’s the last time I’m going to do anything on a farm. You so owe me,” she says before she notices someone else in the room. “Is that him?,” she asks.

“Yes, Liv. Now _remember,_ ” Aaron stresses, “be nice.” Aaron turns back to Robert and hopes that he didn’t notice anything odd about what Liv just said. 

“So...who is she?,” Robert asks.

“This is Liv, my little sister,” Aaron pauses before he focuses back on Liv, “and Liv, this is Robert, my _boyfriend_.”

Liv just huffs a laugh, “Yeah, right. I’m going up to my room. I’ll leave _your bag_ upstairs,” she tells Aaron as she shakes the bag she’s currently holding. 

“Right, thanks,” Aaron says.

She shakes her head as she stomps off upstairs leaving Robert and Aaron alone again. 

Robert sits there silently. “Right, so, you have a sister as well.”

“Yeah, she can be a nightmare at times but I wouldn’t change it for the world,” Aaron says fondly.

“You got the nightmare part right,” Robert says in a hushed tone.

Just as Aaron is about to tell Robert off for that comment, the door that leads into the pub opens up and both men look towards the door. Robert watches as a large bald man with glasses clumsily walks in and has his mouth open as though he’s about to say something but no words seem to come out. 

“Umm...There’s no one out there manning the bar and I just thought maybe Chas or someone might be in here, but, uh... it seems that, uh… that’s not the case...here,” the man manages to say. 

“Mum told you then?,” Aaron asks.

“Yeah….I’m sorry,” the man comes forward and reaches his hand out towards Robert, “I’m Paddy.”

“Right, um, Robert,” he says as he shakes his hand.

“Nice to meet you.”

Aaron’s eyes widen at what Paddy just said while Robert just looks at him strangely. He needs to get Paddy out of the room before he says anything else that could mess this whole thing up. Aaron hurriedly says, “How about we go into the pub Pads and get you that beer?”

“What- Yeah, sure,” Paddy says somewhat confused. 

“Won’t be long,” Aaron tells Robert. 

Robert just nods his head and Aaron gets Paddy out into the back area of the pub. Aaron stops and breathes out. Paddy looks at him with a concerned expression. 

“Aaron, is everything alright?,” Paddy asks. 

Aaron looks at him, “Yeah, everything is good. It’s just…,” he scrunches his face and pinches at the bridge of his nose. 

“What? Is this about his- you know- ‘condition’? Are sure you can go through something like this again?”

This gets Aaron’s attention. His mouth falls open at how Paddy can even suggest something like that. “No Paddy! This is nothing like what it was with him!”

“With Jackson you mean?”

“Paddy, don’t,” Aaron feels sick with the thought that Paddy could even imply that this situation with Robert can even be compared to what happened with Jackson. This is all an act, a fake! Once Robert has finished paying back his dues, he would go back to his old life, remember everything, and be normal again. Jackson was nothing like that. “I know you think this is going to hurt me but it’s not. Robert is perfectly capable of returning back to normal which is why I need you to help me with this.”

“Aaron, I’m sorry if I ups-”

“It’s fine. Just try not to confuse him a lot by asking a lot of questions or bringing up the fact that you don’t know him. He needs to feel like he belongs if he’ll ever gain back his memories.”

“Gosh, I didn’t even think about that. I’ll try to be more careful. But Aaron,” Paddy pauses, “if you need anything, you know I’m here right?”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Right….I’ll go get that pint then. See ya around?”

“Yeah, see ya.”

As Paddy leaves to go towards the bar, Aaron turns back and heads into the backroom where he finds Robert looking at the pictures on the shelves. 

“Is this you?,” Robert asks as he points to the picture of a chavvy lad with a wide grin on his face.

“Yeah, thought I got rid of that one,” he jokingly says.

Robert laughs at that, “Well, your sense of style hasn’t changed much.”

“Hey!,” Aaron says as he pushes at Rob’s shoulder which only furthers his giggles.

“So Paddy,” Robert starts, “seems like a nice guy.”

“Yeah, he’s great. He’s been like a dad to me, you know, always looking out for me.”

“Huh, must be nice to have someone like that around,” Robert says with an almost sad expression on his face.

Aaron looks at him and he can’t do anything but pity him. Robert really thinks that there is no one else out there for him. Even at the hospital, he didn’t have any family that tried to find him and his “wife” had not even bothered to show up even after Robert has been stuck in hospital for almost a week. Robert is no saint and he is definitely an absolute dickhead, but nobody deserves to feel all lost and alone in the world. 

“Let’s get you upstairs and maybe you’ll feel better after a shower,” Aaron suggests. 

“Yeah, I could go for that.”

Aaron leads the way through the door and up the staircase as Robert follows suit. They come onto the landing and Aaron turns back around to face Robert. He must have been following him very closely because by turning around, Aaron was just a breath away from Robert’s face. He is shocked by just how deep his eyes are and how they seem to be more green than blue in this moment. Before he can gaze any further, his own instinct kicks in and he steps back to put at least some distance between them. 

“Right, um, bedroom’s gonna be here,” he says as he points towards the door, “and bathroom’s gonna be there,” he says as he points a little further down the hall. “Fresh towels should be on the middle shelf there for you.”

“Thanks. So my clothes should be in here?”, Robert asks as he points at the bedroom door.

“Yeah,” Aaron says before he remembers the bag Liv most definitely left the clothes in, “probably still in the laundry bag.” 

“Well, guess I’ll get to it.”

“Fine. I’ll meet you downstairs. That sound good?”

“Sure.”

Robert then turns to go into the bathroom while Aaron makes his way downstairs when his phone starts to ring. He takes it out and sees that it’s Adam calling so he picks up.

“Hey, what’s up.”

“Aaron, has Liv made it to the farm or not?”

“Yeah, she’s already been. She’s brought the dusty bag with her and all.”

“Oh no…,” Aaron can hear Adam groan.

“Oh no what?”

“I think she took the wrong bag. I have the bag with my spare clothes with me here. I sent her a text to come in the house but I guess she took the one that was right by the door.”

Perplexed, Aaron asks, “So, what’s in the bag she brought here?”

“That bag had all the clothes that were headed to the bin. Those clothes are all worn down to the bare thread or they were too large for anyone to wear.”

Aaron groans, _can’t anything go right?_ He knows there’s no way he can get to the farm and back in time for Robert to finish taking his shower. _Maybe Adam can bring them over?,_ Aaron thinks and just as that thought crosses his mind, he hears the water shut off in the bathroom. _Shit!_

“Adam, listen to me, get here as soon as you can with the actual clothes he’s meant to be getting and I’ll try to find him at least something decent for now.”

“Ok, I’m on my way then.”

“Thanks, Adam,” Aaron says before he hangs up and tries to rush up the stairs before Robert gets out of the bathroom. He gets to the bedroom and entering it sees Robert standing there with a towel around his waist bending down to look in the bag Liv had left in the room. Aaron freezes. Whether it’s from the sight in front of him or the fear of the fact that his entire charade could be unravelled by the contents of the bag Robert was looking into, he can’t tell. All he knows is that he needs to get closer to what he sees in front of him. As he takes a step closer, Robert slowly rises with a shirt in his hand. A tye dye shirt that is the size of a tent. As Aaron winces at the shirt in Robert’s hands, Robert turns to look behind to see Aaron standing there. With his eyebrows raised, a questioning look on his face and his mouth slightly agape, he puts the shirt up to himself. It covers his chest, stomach, and the better portion of where his thighs would be. Robert glances down between the shirt and the man opposite him in search of some answer that would explain why this dress of a shirt is currently in his hands. 

“What...is...this?,” Robert asks incredulously as he’s having a hard time believing that this piece of attire could ever be a part of his wardrobe. This tacky, oversized, unsightly piece of fabric is just too ugly for anyone to own. 

Aaron just stands there silently, unable to think of a single reason why anyone would ever have a shirt like that. _Why in the world did Adam have this?_

“Well?!,” Robert asks impatiently. 

“...That is… your old shirt,” Aaron comes up with. 

Robert just stares at him before slowly looking back at the shirt in his hands. This can’t be right. “This atrocity can not possibly be something that I own!”

“Well, it is,” Aaron states, hoping his confidence fools Robert. “I mean you were…,” Aaron spreads his arms and motions his hands around his waist, “big.”

Robert lets out a chuckle, more from disbelief than anything. “Me? I was fat?”

“Yeah, but you put in a lot of hard work, especially with all that walking you’ve been doing, and you’ve done really well for yourself.”

Robert just stands there silently, shocked. He puts the shirt down and just looks into the bag to see what else he had in his belongings. He finds a few pairs of large shorts and maybe the odd neon tank top here and there but mostly, there are some dull colored decently sized shirts and pants that seemed to fit okay. Aaron sighed in relief seeing that most of the stuff in the bag was decent enough to satisfy Robert. 

“Well, I’ll leave you to it,” Aaron says. 

Robert watches as Aaron exits the room and selects what he’ll wear for today. He contemplates whether he should just dress in the most ridiculous clothes he has to see if maybe wearing that might spark a memory or two of actually buying the ghastly things but decides against it as he doesn’t think he wants to return to that state of mind if it ever did exist. After Robert chose a long sleeved gray polo shirt and a dark blue pair of trousers, he heads down the stairs. As he goes through the door leading to the little backroom of the pub, he sees Aaron bending down in the kitchen getting a pot from the looks of it. 

Aaron gets back up and turns around to see Robert there and smiles. “See you finally made it down.”

“Yeah, tough choice between the vomit green top and this misery grey shirt,” Robert says sarcastically. 

Aaron chuckles at that, “I’ll have your normal clothes out of the wash soon, so don’t get too miserable.”

“Yeah, right as if I can’t get even more depressed at what my life is.”

“Not if you get your memory back. So, let’s start with something easy to get you back to your normal self.”

“Right, and that is..?”

“Cooking!,” Aaron says as he raises the pot in one hand and a box of pasta in the other.

Robert just looks at him dumbfounded. “I cooked?”

“Yes. Now you weren’t a master chef but you did alright. So,” Aaron shoves the pot towards Robert, “here you are.”

Robert takes the pot with both hands awkwardly and stares down at it and just as he’s about to utter his protest Aaron drops the pasta box in the pot. 

“I’ll get Liv to join us at the table for a nice dinner. Alright?,” Aaron asks.

“Uh..”

“Good! Be back in just a sec,” Aaron says as he patted him on the shoulder and then rushed by him leaving Robert alone in the kitchen. 

Robert sets the pasta and pot down, places his hands on the counter, and starts to just breathe. _So currently, it seems that I live in this dump, wander around like a hippie for no reason, dress like a complete wacko, and am expected to make dinner in this tiny little kitchen,_ Robert thinks to himself. He takes a deep breath. _If I could handle everything before this, I can most certainly handle cooking up this bit of pasta._

He proceeds to follow the instructions on the side of the box and places the long strands of pasta in the small pot. The water starts to boil and what little bit of the pasta is in the water start to soften while the rest of it leaning at an angle out of the pot remains stiff. He leaves for the moment and sees if there is anything in the refrigerator that can act as the sauce like it shows on the pasta box picture.

Aaron and Liv come through the door and Liv makes her way to sit on the couch and avoids looking at Robert.

Aaron asks him, “Everything going alright?”

“Yep, so far.”

“Alright then,” Aaron says. He then joins his sister on the couch and switches the TV channel to some action movie that Liv didn’t seem to be bothered by.

Some time passes and an unpleasant burning smell protrudes from the kitchen.

“Is something burning?,” Liv asks.

It’s only then that Robert looks at the boiling pot and realises something’s wrong with the pasta and he rushes to try and break the outer strands and put it all in the pot. Just as he has his hands on the pasta ready to break it, a big bubble of boiling water bursts and splashes onto Robert’s hands. 

“AHH!,” Robert screams as he removes his hands and starts to rub them. 

Liv turns to look and sees the pasta burning and she rushes in the back and Aaron gets up and rushes to Robert. He turns off the oven and gets Robert to have a seat at the table. 

“Hey, you ok?,” Aaron asks.

“No! I smell hair!”

“It’s ok. I'll get the burn ointment. You'll be alright,” Aaron tries to soothe him. He reaches in a drawer and gets the ointment and starts to put some on his hand.

“Ouch!,” Robert yells. 

“OK, let's see,well you should be okay now.”

Before Robert even has a moment to say his thanks, a big spray from a fire extinguisher covers Robert and the kitchen as Liv tries to aim the nozzle at the pot. Aaron just looks at the scene before him and can’t help but laugh. 

“Way to go, Liv. If we ever need if firefighter, we know who to call,” he says as he laughs.

“Soz. Didn’t think it would go off that badly,” Liv says. 

Robert just sits there silently trying to take in everything that just happened. 

“I’m going to go get you a towel. Liv try to clean off some of that spray from the kitchen. I’ll go and see if Marlon has some leftovers from the kitchen he’s willing to part with in the face of our tragic cooking incident,” Aaron chuckles as he gets up and goes through towards the pub. 

After Aaron returns with a few sandwiches, some slightly past their due date crisps, and two bottles of beer and he sets everything on the table and puts the kettle on. Liv takes a seat next to the motionless Robert while Aaron puts out some napkins and sits down next to Robert. Liv starts to dig into her sandwich and as Robert sees her devour the meal, he picks up his own sandwich and takes a bite. While it was not the best, Robert felt the first bit of relief ever since being reintroduced to his daily life. _At least the food’s not as horrific as everything else in this place._ The kettle whistles and Aaron goes to make Liv a cup of tea. Aaron sips at his beer and Robert does the same. As soon as the flavor hits his tongue, he scrunched his face at the taste. 

“What? You don’t like beer?”, Aaron asked.

“Chilled or even slightly cool beer yes. This is warm and flat,” Robert complains.

“Well, living in the pub you can’t really use up all your good stock of beer if you’re trying to make a profit,” Aaron laughed.

Robert pouted, “Hard to believe this place can even turn a profit.”

“Well, it does,” Aaron says defensively. 

The atmosphere grows awkward as Aaron and Liv finished up their meal and Robert refused to touch the remaining food on his plate. Liv, feeling the tension in the room rise, excuses herself to go upstairs as quickly as she can, leaving her plate on the table. With only Aaron and Robert left at the table, Aaron is the first to speak up.

“Come on. You need to finish that so that you at least have some food in ya. I’m positive that Marlon’s cooking is way better than the stuff they give ya in the hospital.”

Robert remains silent but picks up the remainder of his sandwich and starts to eat it again. 

“Good. Finish that up and then you can clean up around here and I’ll go meet Adam downtown,” Aaron says as he’s getting up and heading towards the back door. 

Robert’s eyes widen. Him… cleaning?

“You’re leaving me here to clean up? By myself? Alone?,” Robert asks in a panic.

“I’m sure you’ll manage. Besides, the doctor said you need to get back into your usual routine, and this is what you normally do.”

“But I’m just out of hospital-”

“And physically you checked out all right except for a few scrapes and bruises meaning there’s nothing stopping you from doing some cleaning,” Aaron says with a smirk.

As Robert gets up, Aaron makes a quick escape leaving Robert alone with a mess of dishes, bottles, and cups. Thinking there’s nothing he can do about it, he starts to collect the dishes and puts them on the kitchen counter. He looks to see if there might be a dishwasher but there wasn’t one, so he went on to put everything in the sink. He looks around the sink area to see if there is any soap and he finds a bar of soap at the corner of the sink. He takes that and starts to rub at it until some suds start forming and then he takes a dish carefully in between his index finger and thumb and starts to rub the bar of soap against the dish. It wasn’t working as effectively as he had hoped it would so he took a stronger grip of the plate and starting rubbing it harder. Now that was working. After the first dish, he did the second and the third and felt accomplished in being able to complete this task. He then finished up his washing and rinsed of the suds and chunks of soap from the dishes and found a towel to dry them all off with. He opened the cabinets to find all sorts of mismatching dinnerware and went ahead and added on top of it as there was no way he was going to sort through that mess. 

Robert then goes to sit on the couch and begins to contemplate about the events that transpired today. So much had happened, he was told so much of what he was and what he did, but still, nothing that he remembered. _Well, guess this is where my life is at. Hoping one day I’ll remember a shred of what I used to be...but do I really want to if this is where I end up?_

* * * * *

As nighttime fell on the manor, Diane was sat in the living room with a stern look on her face. After the disastrous attempt at a family meal, the Sugdens were unsettled. She had such felt a heavy weight within whenever she thought back to the events of that day. How she wishes things were different. If only Robert made more of an effort and Andy was not so aggressive, then maybe, just maybe, they could all behave like a family and give her peace of mind. Diane sighs as she sits back on her armchair. She has been feeling off and needed some rest. While her thoughts occupied her, the butler comes into the room with a tray of tea. 

“Refreshments, madam?”

“Oh, thank you Doug,” Diane says as she grabs herself a cup, “You always know what I need.”

Normally, he would resume his duties, but this time he stands silently by her side. As though he has something else to take care of.

“What is it Doug?,” Diane asks curiously.

“If I may, it seems that you have been somewhat reserved recently. Might it have to do with the scuffle between Robert and Andy from a few weeks back?”

“Hmm, you see right through me pet,”Diane chuckles to herself. “I just wish I knew what to do. Something needs to happen to get those two to find some middle ground. It can’t always be like this,” Diane stresses. 

Doug says nothing until Diane sends him a pleading look, as though any suggestion is welcome. 

“Would it not be wise to try communicating with them both separately, convince them, and then have them sort it out amongst themselves.”

“But we’ve tried that, every time Robert comes here, he and Andy have a bust up,” Diane exasperates. 

“Then maybe they shouldn’t be in the same room when you talk to them. Maybe speaking one on one will be more effective in this case,” Doug suggests.

Diane considers it as Doug makes his exit. She smiles as she reaches for the antique phone on the side table. She presses in the numbers. The phone line rings. 

“You’ve reached Robert Sugden. I’m currently unavailable at the moment but just leave your name, phone number, and a brief message and I’ll give you a call back shortly.”

_*beep*_

“Robert, this is Diane. Give me a call back when you can.”

She puts the phone back hoping to feel somewhat lighter but still can’t shake that something’s wrong. She decides to give his fiance a call, just to make sure she covered all bases. She’s back on the phone. This time the line’s picked up. 

“Hello,” Chrissie says.

“Hi Chrissie, it’s Diane. I was just wondering, is Robert about.” 

“No, I think he went into Hotten for some business some time ago?”

“Did he say when he’d be back?”

“No, he didn’t say. Hey! Put that back down or I swear you-,” Chrissie trails off as her voice seemed to be muffled by her hand covering the phone. “Sorry, Diane, what did you say?”

“He hasn’t called you or anything?,” Diane asks as she’s starting to get more worried.

“No Diane, I’ve been a bit busy with other things and don’t have the time right now to keep an eye out for every little thing he does,” Chrissie replies, her frustrations coming through the phone, “and he should be fine. He goes on conventions and meetings all the time. Now I’m sorry but I’ve got to get back to work. Bye.”

Diane isn’t sure if this is a good sign or not. She decides to make one last phone call to Victoria hoping she might know if everything is ok with Robert.

“Hi. Diane? what’s wrong?,” Vic answers

“I don’t know Victoria. But have you heard from Robert?”

“Not recently, why?”

Diane’s quiet before she sighs, “Maybe I’m making something out of nothing. I’ve been trying to reach Robert but he doesn't answer his phone, Chrissie says last she heard of him he was in Hotten, and still not a word from him.”

“Diane, you know that’s not like him. How long ago did you call him?,” Victoria asks, as she senses the worry in Diane’s voice. 

“A few minutes.”

“Well, Diane there’s nothing to worry about then. Give him a few hours. He probably ran out of battery. He’ll check his phone and give you call right back. Don’t worry,” Victoria tries to convince her. 

“Oh what a relief. I’ve just not been myself recently. Must have just gotten carried away. Thanks for listening.”

“Anytime, you have a good night Diane.”

“You too. Good night.”

Diane hangs up the phone, feeling better after her talk with Victoria. She knew she was just overthinking all this so she finishes the remaining tea in her cup and heads upstairs for some rest. On the other side of the line though, Vic began to have her own suspicions. It is really unlike Robert for him to not tell anyone where he is exactly and when he would be coming back. That man had a tight schedule. She began to wonder if Robert really was ok.

* * * * *

The pub that Aaron and Adam went to was loud and busy but the atmosphere was still pleasant enough to get by. They were able to get a spot towards the back and were sitting on the same side of the booth. As Adam was finishing off his pint, Aaron started giggling into his drink. 

Adam raises an eyebrow and asks, “What’s so funny?”

“Oh nothing. I was just, heh, remembering those ‘clothes’ you had.”

“Oh come off it man,” Adam says as he leans back in his seat and winces.

“I mean you are lucky I was able to convince Robert that he actually owned those clothes. I can’t believe you owned them once!,” Aaron says to Adam. 

“Hey, I don’t judge you for your ‘I’m a rebel chav’ period so you can’t judge me for my old raving style,” Adam says, getting quieter towards the end.

“Wait. So you mean to tell me that those were your ‘raving clothes’? You would actually wear that to a club and hope to pull?! Hah!,” Aaron laughs. 

“Well, yeah. Definitely wasn't a winner on that front. It was alright though since we had this one group of lads that got together every night or so and we could all have a laugh with the girls. I guess this one lad that came with us- it was this big dude- he accidently packed some of his stuff in my bag. Finally thought I’d get rid of it but I never thought that this would happen,” Adam says as he joins Aaron’s laughter. 

“Thankfully you had a few decent clothes in there.”

“Hey, all those clothes are decent!”

“Fine, fine,” Aaron settles Adam and takes a sip of his beer.

“So, how does Robert feel about everything else?”

“Well,” Aaron pauses, “he’s accepting it but being the rich boy that he was, he still can’t do much in helping out. You should have seen what happened with the dinner. I mean, this man could burn water! I had to get some of Marlon’s leftovers for tonight.” 

“Oh well, if he’s shit at everything, what are you gonna do with him?,” Adam asks. He then gasps, “Don’t tell me you are going to dress him up as a maid and have him dusting around the house?,” Adam says in a mocking tone of horror.

Aaron slaps Adam on the arm. “No you sicko! What kind of fantasies do you have in that sick head of yours?,” Aaron laughs. 

“I mean, you must fancy him, even just a bit? Cuz there is no way it’s his cooking that’ll keep you sane for these next couple of days.”

“Ughh, you got that right!”

“But I’m being serious here. How long has it been since you’ve-?”

Aaron just sends him a look, “I am not even gonna go there. So what if he is somewhat attractive? I’m not about to take advantage of anybody.”

“I wasn't suggesting that, but it’s been a while since you've had someone in your life, hasn’t it?”

Aaron stays silent for a moment, “This is business. He is working off the payment he owes me for the tools and the job and that’s that. Nothing more.”

“Fine... so you do think he’s attractive, right?,” Adam says teasingly.

Aaron sends him another glare as he blushes. He quickly goes to finish off his beer. “Place is dead. Let’s head back.”

“Oh come one man, I didn’t mean to get you upset.”

“Nah, I’m not upset,” Aaron pauses, “Besides, there is someone waiting for me at home,” he jokes with a cheeky grin. Aaron lets out a bit of a chuckle. “Let's just hope he hasn't flooded the pub.”

Adam lets out a boisterous laugh as he gets up from the table. “Oh man, what have you gotten yourself into,” Adam says as he hangs an arm around Aaron and they both walk out of the pub. 

They grab a taxi and head home. Aaron tried to get back into the pub as quietly as he can and go up the stairs the best he could in his slightly drunken state. He made it up without causing too much noise and got to his bedroom door. As he opens it, he notices that a light is already on. He walks in to see Robert staring up at the ceiling, pulling the blanket closer to himself. He turns his head to look at Aaron and with his hair was flat against his forehead, he looked tired. Seeing it was only Aaron, he visibly relaxed and exhaled a long breath. 

“Oh, it’s you,” Robert exasperates. 

Aaron huffs in response.

“Took you long enough,” Robert continues.

Aaron just squints his eyes at him and then shakes his head, dismissing what Robert just said. He just moves to sit on the edge of his bed and starts to take off his shoes. 

“Are you going to sleep?,” Robert asks.

“Yep.”

“I don’t think we should be in the same bed considering I feel as if I barely know you.”

Aaron straightens up again and turns to look at Robert. “Well, that won’t be a problem since you’ll be sleeping on the couch downstairs,” he says with a smile. 

“What do you mean?! Did you somehow forget that I’m just out of hospital! I can’t be sleeping on a couch!”

“Yes, but you always said how the soft mattress does your back in so you like to sleep on the couch instead. I’m just saving you the trouble of having a bad morning.”

“Hah, as if this morning hasn’t already been the worst I think I’ll ever have.”

Aaron continues to look at him.

“You don’t seriously expect me to sleep on the couch, do you?”

“Yes I do. Trust me, it’s for the best.”

Robert just stares back at him, astonished. After seeing that Aaron is not backing down, he huffs and whips the blanket away from himself and reveals that he is in one of the ghastly neon tank top and his boxers, a sight at which Aaron had to stifle his laughter at. Robert rose up from the bed and headed out the door while Aaron continued to undress and got ready for bed. 

Robert went down the stairs, stepped into the back room, and just stood still. He took a moment to once more look at the unlit outdated room that he had to clean up earlier and frowned. To him, it felt like something he had never done before, as if his arms and body had never moved in that way, which is why he can’t understand how this was his everyday life. He sighs and heads towards the lumpy couch and lies down on it. He covers himself in a tacky blanket that was on the side of the couch and stares at the empty space in front of him. He closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and leans his head back. _How am I supposed to handle this? This is like a bad dream. A nightmare I just can’t get out of. But it’s not. This is it. This is my life._


	3. A New Type of Life

The lively notes of the piano and accompanying violins, cellos, and flutes play throughout the grand room as people mingle about and sip at their champagne glasses. Everybody is here to enjoy themselves and laugh the night away. Dressed in lavish attire and extravagant eye masks, the crowd of people are there to show off their riches as they perfectly complement the evening’s elaborate masquerade theme. Caterers and servers bustle through the crowds, providing delectable treats that were imported straight from all sorts of countries and bubbling champagne to accompany them. Everything was perfect. 

The sound of a fork hitting against a glass spreads across the room.

“Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please,” the masked butler announces. As everybody quiets down and looks at the butler, he lifts his hand in the direction of the winding staircase. 

Everybody in attendance looked up at the top of the staircase and watched as a woman, with her brunette hair done up beautifully, in a gorgeous beige gown dripping with jewels, and a lacy white eye mask woven with sparkling diamonds, stepped out. She lifted her gloved hand to the right and was joined by another person. It was a blonde man dressed in a fitting black suit and a simple white eye mask that took her hand and they both stood there for the world to see. Whether the people looked upon them in admiration or with jealousy, all that was important was that all those in attendance knew that these two were the reason they were all here this evening. A round of applause started up and the two smiled and began to come down. The shimmer of the chandelier cascaded on the pair as they started to make their way down the stairs and highlighted just how different they are in comparison to everyone else. They were both synchronised, not missing a beat, and they were flawless in every imaginable aspect. When they reached the main floor, a hush of silence echoed. 

The woman looked at the man and smiled once more. “Robert, isn't this perfect?”

He looks at her. “Yes,” he looks at the gazing crowd and smiles, “it is.”

_[ https://youtu.be/6adA5okupTI ](https://youtu.be/6adA5okupTI) _

The piano starts to play a soft melody that seemed to resemble the ever romantic classic, La Vie en Rose. After the first few notes, the cello joined in and gave life to the song. The crowd of people began to couple up and slowly filled the space of the grand room. The dancing pairs began to step along to the first notes of the enchanting melody and soon the room was filled with people dancing the waltz. 

Robert reaches his hand out to the woman and looks over at her. “May I have this dance?,” he asks with a knowing smile.

She nods and accepts his hand.

The couple walks out onto the dance floor and readies their stance for a waltz as the music paused for a moment. As the music resumed, Robert gently pulls her in and they begin to dance to the beat. They take the center of the ballroom and move gracefully from one end to the other. Her dress catches the light in a way that makes her look as if she herself is made of diamonds and Robert twirls her round all the more. She laughs and holds onto him a bit closer. Robert then focuses solely on the flow of the music and lets it carry them throughout the ballroom. Soon enough, the dancing pairs stopped their movement to gaze upon the eye-catching couple in awe of how perfectly synchronized and graceful their moves were. The mesmerized guests formed a circle around the twirling couple and watched as the dancing couple smoothly took control of the room. 

As the music swelled, Robert brought her close to his chest and held her chin up softly. She looks up at him with a radiant smile on her face and a sparkle in her eyes that shines through the lace of the eye mask. 

“Everybody's looking at us,” he says in a low tone so that only she could hear him. 

She leans in close to Robert’s ear and whispers, “Let them.” 

Robert smiles and places his hand back where it was before. She takes a step backwards and Robert follows along. The beautiful melody wraps around the two and they continue their show of elegance and grace for the people. This moment and all those before, they are all part of the show. The show that proves to everybody around them that these two were at a level of perfection that no one could ever hope to achieve. 

At this moment, Robert felt invincible. There was nothing stopping him from being the center of attention and nothing that was out of his reach. This is the life he was born for. A life where he felt admired and worshipped. A life where there wasn’t a single person who would dare oppose him or attempt to make him do anything. A life where he alone could have the world at his feet. 

As the music continued to sound throughout the ballroom, the woman stopped the couple’s dance somewhat abruptly. Confused, Robert looks at her wondering what could have made her want to stop. She separates herself from him and looks over to one area on the opposite end of the ballroom. She then gestures her hand upwards with a flick of the wrist and within a moment, a loud pop echoed throughout the ballroom. The crowd stopped and looked towards the sound and that is when they saw glittering gold confetti falling above their heads. 

Robert looks up feeling a bit astonished and lets out a small chuckle. “I’ll say this. I wasn’t expecting that.”

“Oh please. What’s a party without a bit of surprise?,” she answered with a jovial tone.

He continued to look at the cascading bits of gold and it felt as if he was seeing stars twinkling on their spiral downwards. The fantastic display got a thunderous applause from the crowd and that made Robert smile. He looks up above himself. The golden confetti started to catch in his hair. Then, some landed on his face. He tried to shake it off but he couldn’t. Strangely, they started to feel cold. The confetti continued to fall… more and more… 

Robert feels wet as he quickly gasps for breath.

“Wake up! Up, up, up! Come on!,” an unwelcome voice says.

Robert, barely awake, raspily calls out with his hands stretched out, “Help, help!”

“Got to get you up and early now, don’t I?,” Aaron says with a smirk.

Robert opens his eyes to see Aaron standing above him as he finishes drying off his hair. He raises his head above the flat pillow and looks around the room and sees the soft morning light coming through the window, the tv is on some local news station on a very low volume, and the radio on the table is playing soft piano music. He winces and groans.  _ That’s right. I’m… here.  _

“Time to get up. Gotta fix Liv's lunch or she’ll miss the bus for school,” Aaron says walking around the couch. 

“I don't care if she doesn’t go to school,” Robert said as he lays his head back down and turns over in a dramatic fashion.

“Okay, well, that’ll just mean she’ll be with you all day,” Aaron says as he is heading back up the stairs to his own room. 

Robert’s eyes widened. He doesn't know how to take care of a child, especially some unpredictable teenager. He quickly gets up and throws the covers to the side. He gets into the small kitchen and opens the mini fridge under the counter and sees jam, milk, and eggs. Out of those three, jam is the one he feels he can't mess up so he grabs that and places it on the counter. He looks around and sees some leftover bread on the counter with some butter and a butterknife beside it. Somebody must have made some toast earlier but that just makes it easier for him as he gets the bread spread out on the counter and then slathers in an uneven layer of butter on the first slice and a thick layer of jam on the next. It seems to be going well so far until he tries to find a bag to put all this stuff together into and he comes up empty. He searches all the cabinets and can't see anything that could work until he finds a raggedy plastic shopping bag in the under cabinet. He looks inside it and sees that it's clean so he puts all the slices on top of each other in there and ties the bag off at the top.  _ There done! _

Robert heard a quick stomping coming down the stairs as a shrill voice yells, “Aaron! I'm gonna be late!”

_ That must be Liv now. _

“Don't worry, you still got 5 minutes! Robert made your lunch so make sure to grab that on your way down!,” Aaron yells from upstairs.

_ And there’s the devil. _

Liv comes bursting through the doorway and makes her way around the couch towards the kitchen. She looks at the shopping bag on the counter and then back up at Robert. 

“This is my lunch? What is it?”

“Couple sandwiches.”

She opens up the bag and looks inside and frowns. “Did you seriously put everything on top of each other? You didn’t just make a couple, you made one mega sandwich! What did you even-”

“LIV! 2 minutes!,” Aaron yelled.

“Ugh, whatever,” Liv scoffs as she takes the bag and goes out the front of the pub. 

“Ungrateful little-,” Robert starts to vent as Aaron walks in wearing a simple black long sleeve shirt and a pair of black jeans to match. He had a piece of paper and a set of keys in his hand. He smiles at Robert with his eyebrows raised. 

“Feel like anything came back?,” Aaron asked as he taps a finger against his head.

“No,” Robert says as he crosses his arms across his chest. “If anything I feel further away from getting my memories back than I did yesterday.”

“I thought you would feel like that so I made you a list that will help you get in the groove of things again.” Aaron walks over to where Robert was standing in the kitchen and hands him the piece of paper that has a list of chores on it. 

Robert reads over the list and furrows his brow and his mouth drops. He looks back up at Aaron and breathes out a laugh. “This… I mean… You can’t be serious.”

“What do you mean?,” Aaron asks with an innocent look on his face.

“I mean, cleaning the toilets in the pub and doing the laundry? That definitely doesn’t sound like something I’d be doing,” Robert insists. 

“You said you would help my mum out with running the pub and that includes doing some stuff around the house as well. I don’t see what is so difficult to understand about that.”

“Really? Me?”

“Yes and don’t you think you can just sack this off. I gave my mum the same list so that she can help you get back in the swing of things as soon as possible. Now go upstairs, change into some regular clothes, and get to workin’.”

Robert just looks at Aaron with defeat in his eyes. Aaron, in return, looks in the direction of the stairs and back at Robert with a grin on his face. Seeing there was nothing else he can do, Robert sighs and moves past Aaron and heads up the stairs. 

“Have fun!,” Aaron yells before he hears a door slam.  _ And with that, he can finally begin to repay his debt.  _

Aaron heads out the back and goes to his car ready to head into Hotten and back into the office before he hears his name called out.

“Aaron wait up!”

Aaron turned around to see his uncle Cain approaching him. 

“What's up?,” Aaron asks.

“Hey, I heard about your situation with your boyfriend staying over. With the memory loss and all that.”

“Okay. What of it?”

“Look, I know that since that one client stiffed you over the payment and got rid of half of your tools you haven't had much luck getting any jobs so if you wanted to, I need some help with the cars at the garage.”

“Thanks. I really appreciate that but I can't be at the garage and running my own business at the same time.”

“I know. Which is why you can work on the cars overnight.”

Aaron takes a second to think it over. “I think that could work. Thanks Cain. Didn't think you'd be such a softie for me,” Aaron teases.

“One more crack like that outta you and I won't be needing any help at the garage. Besides, your mum wouldn't let me hear the end of it if she knew I needed help and didn't get you for the job.”

“Yeah. Best not to get on her bad side,” Aaron laughs.

Cain sends Aaron a stern look and his laughter died down. “Right then, see you later,” Cain says in his usual gruff tone and he starts walking back towards the garage.

“Alright, bye.” 

Aaron opened up his car and got inside. He has a few jobs up in Hotten and now when he comes home, he can get some extra cash from the garage. That should get him back on his feet quicker than he thought, which he is more than grateful for.  _ Only thing now is to hope Chas isn't working poor Robert to death….  _ Aaron looks up at the window to his bedroom and imagines Robert struggling to choose a less hideous shirt than what he slept in. Aaron chuckles,  _ Nah. He’ll be fine. _

* * * * *

Robert hears a car driving away outside just as he finishes cleaning himself up.  _ Good riddance.  _ He puts on a dark blue shirt with a pair of blue jeans and smooths out whatever wrinkles he can find. He looks at the list that Aaron gave him and crumples it up before reading it and throws it away. He heads downstairs and into the bar to find Chas kneeling down, stocking the fridge with orange juice bottles. Hearing his footsteps, Chas turns around and sends him a smile. 

“Hi Robert. How are you? Feeling any better?”

“If by better you mean have I remembered anything, then no.”

Chas looks at him with pity. “Oh, you poor thing. Well, don’t you worry. We’ll get you back to normal in no time.”

“I hope so,” Robert sighs as he looks around.

“So…anything coming back to you being behind a bar?”

“Not really. It all feels… off.”

“That’s okay. I’ll show you the ropes and as you get used to it all again, it might start coming back,” Chas says with a hint of optimism. 

Robert lets out a huff of air, “Yeah, I hope so.” 

“Now, let’s start off with the glasses,” Chas says as she points to the glassware beneath the bar. 

After some time had passed, it was already around noon. This is when Robert knew why his brain was blocking out this part of his life. It’s because it was just a list of never ending tasks that piled on top of each other that never gave him a chance to even take a breath. Each task was getting more frustrating and unpleasant as he did them. Chas had started him off learning the glass types and the drinks the bar had. Learning the drinks came easy to him since he actually felt like he knew them. He even knew some of the more obscure, high priced stuff that anybody rarely gets. After that Chas showed him how to work the bar, pour drinks, and take orders. While he caught on fairly quickly, it was quite overwhelming when Chas had to leave him alone to work the rush so that she could get some groceries from the store for the kitchen. He had to take so many different orders and run them back to the kitchen, pour one pint after the other and make sure they didn't spill, and change the barrel like Chas showed him when there was only froth coming from the tap all by himself while the crowd of people seemed to never end. He also got screamed at by a customer who got the wrong order which only ‘added’ to his fun day. After the rush was done, Chas came back from the store and had Robert help her carry it all into the kitchen. After Robert finished that, he finally had a chance to sit down but just as he sat down, Chas called him over to the restrooms. Robert follows her, not understanding what she wanted, until he saw the mop and bucket next to the restroom door. He starts to back out but Chas catches him by the shirt. 

“Oh no you don't! I need you to clean the restrooms while I mind the bar.”

“But I don't think I can do this!,” Robert whined as he points his hands at the objects in front of him. 

“Now don't think your amnesia will get you out of doing some cleaning. You said it yourself you want to remember quicker so doing this should definitely help with that,” Chas states enthusiastically. 

Robert just squints his eyes and opens his mouth. He can't see how doing a task as vile as this could be of any benefit to him. 

“Okay, get to it!”

Chas goes back into the main area of the pub, leaving Robert with his unfortunate dilemma. Robert looks at the mop. The wooden handle was unpolished and the white strands of the mop were mucked with something gray and seemingly non cleansable. He sighs and grabs it and heads into the men's restroom and groans at the mess before him. 

After he finished up with both the restrooms, as well as cleaning his hands in the sink for at least 10 minutes, he heads back out into the pub. Chas was pouring a pint but all that was coming out was froth. As she looked up and saw Robert, she got a smile on her face and called him over once more. He followed as she led him to the basement which seems to be the storeroom for all the kegs. There Chas has him change a barrel. Never before did Robert think that beer could be so heavy. After connecting the right pipes to the barrel, they went back up to the pub where he minded the bar for the next rush. 

When the bar was closing, he was given a wipe and some cleaning spray and he went about the pub cleaning off all the table tops and making sure there was nothing on the seats. At first he didn't try to really put in any effort to wipe them clean, since the whole day just knocked the wind out of him, but then Chas got mad at him for half assing it so he had to put in his last bit of strength into making sure everything was spotless. 

He was finally let go to get some rest and all he wanted to do was crash on the couch and sleep but he couldn't. As soon as he sits on the couch, Liv comes in and asks what's for dinner. He groans and puts his face into his hands.

“Just go get something from the kitchen,” Robert muffles out.

“But I thought you'd be cooking for us every night, ‘just like you  _ always _ did’?”

“Liv, I have been working at the pub the whole day and I just don't think I have enough brain power to get me up from this couch to make you something and then walk back.”

“But you would  _ always _ make me something even if you worked a 12 hour shift in the pub. Come on, please! I don't think I can survive off crisps any more,” she pouts.

Robert looks at her pleading face and feels a little guilty. “Fine, I'll make toast.”

“Eh,” she shrugs, “still better than nothing. Bring it up to my room when you’re done!,” Liv says as she races back up the stairs. 

“Saying please wouldn't go amiss!,” Robert yells to her.

He goes to the kitchen and gets two slices of bread and puts it in the toaster. He looks at the settings on the toaster and decides that the numbers stand for the number of slices there are in the toaster so he sets it to two. After a minute or so, he smells a slight burning from the toaster and before he gets a chance to stop the toaster, the toast popped out. He carefully takes the slices out and observes their dark shade of brown with speckles of black all over.  _ Technically, this is still toast.  _ He puts the toast on a plate and is about to bring it up to her room when he approaches the stairs and his body suddenly turns against him. As he tried to lift his leg to take the first step up, his sore legs and feet made him feel the burn in every muscle of his body. All that cleaning and lugging around he did earlier felt like an entirely new sensation to him and he was definitely not used to it. He grits through the pain and slowly makes his way up the stairs until he finally reaches Liv’s room and enters. He sees that she is sitting at her desk hunched over with headphones in and just as he gets a step into her room, she turns around. 

“Hey! Knock first!,” Liv says. 

Robert groans but still walks towards her, “Ugh, I don't have time for this.” He comes up to her desk and places the plate beside her. “Here's your toast.”

She looks at it and back at him. “What is this?”

“It’s toast.”

“Nah, this is charcoal. There is no way this is edible.”

Robert starts to get frustrated. “Yes it is so eat it.”

“No thanks. I need actual toast and not this garbage.”

“This is toast!”

“Oh yeah? Prove it.”

Robert grabs a slice and takes a bite. The ashy taste hit him quickly but he wasn’t going to let this teenage brat see it. He gulps down the gravel-like substance and goes for another bite.

“See? This toast is just fine,” he says with a mouthful.

“Ugh, fine. Whatever. You can go now.”

“And what about a ‘thank you’?”

Liv puts her headphones back in. Robert scoffs and leaves the room. _ That little-,  _ he begins to think until he reaches Aaron’s room. He sighs and tries to let all the anger go.  _ At least now I get to go to bed.  _ He walks into Aaron's empty room and gets a fresh T-shirt. He takes off his shirt and pants that he worked in and keeps on the plain tee and boxers he had underneath. He looks at the comfy bed and wonders why on earth he would ever prefer sleeping on a couch when this perfectly good bed exists. He thinks that he could maybe just sleep here and forget what Aaron told him but then when he thinks of Aaron, he quickly heads back downstairs. Even if he thought Aaron was handsome and attractive, Robert still doesn't want to be anywhere near him since all he'll do is just find some new task to ‘add to the list’ for him to do. Robert gets on the couch, covers himself with the same blanket he did the night before, and shuts his eyes. The first day was finally over and Robert could finally go to rest. 

What he didn’t expect was that he would have to do this all again the next day since the next morning, Robert’s dream was abruptly interrupted by a loud foghorn telling him to get up. 

“RISE AND SHINE!,” Chas, who was up bright and early, said loudly. 

“Do you even know what time it is?,” Robert asks groggily.

“It’s five in the morning which means it’s one hour til we open. So up and attem!”

“Mmhmm,” Robert hums sarcastically as he turns over and snuggles up in his blanket.

As Robert gets comfortable again, Chas rips the blanket off him. That gets Robert up real quick. 

“What’d you do that for?!”

“If you have any hope of remembering, you have to get back into your routine. And that includes getting up early in the morning.”

He stands up and gets a yawn out of him while heads upstairs to take a shower. After the shockingly cold water fully awakened all his senses, he got changed into some work appropriate clothes and headed downstairs to find Chas. He didn’t see her at the bar so he started to look around. He then heard her voice out by the front doors so he walked out to find her talking to a delivery man and began to carry in a couple of large boxes.

“What a standin’ around for? Go on,” Chas says as she nods her head in the direction of the delivery truck where the man was unloading boxes onto the ground. 

Robert walks over and grabs the first box and is glad that it is decently light and carries it in. Seemed easy enough until he got to one that was heavy. He bends over at the waist and tries to lift the box and it proves to be quite strenuous but he’s able to lift it and get it inside.He carries in a few like that and his arms are starting to get tired. As he’s just about finished with all the boxes, Chas follows him out after she had a chance to organize the boxes a bit and sees him about to lift the last heavy box. She frowns.

“You know you are gonna throw your back out if you keep doing it that way, right?”

“What do you mean?,” Robert wheezes as he tries to lift the box. 

“I mean,” Chas walks over and bends down at the knees, “you need to lift with your knees,” she picks up the box with ease, “and not with your back,” she finishes as she lifts back up from her knees and stands there with the box in her hands. “Don’t tell me you even forgot that?”

Robert looks upon her in amazement. “I honestly can’t say. I feel like doing all this manual labor is so foreign to me.”

“Hah! It won’t be foreign for long!,” Chas jokes as she goes inside with the box leaving Robert outside.

The delivery man comes around and asks Robert for a signature and Robert picks up the pen and signs his scribble of a name with complete ease. Before he hands the pen back, his mind catches up with him and he realizes that he just wrote his signature without having to even think about it, as if he did it through muscle memory.  _ Now that feels like something I used to do! _ He smiles as he is overjoyed that something feels familiar again. He hands the pen back and the delivery man gets back into his truck and drives away. 

Robert comes back inside feeling a little bit more confident about finding himself but that feeling was soon crushed when Chas was standing there with a mop and bucket. Robert sighs, but he takes them and heads to the restrooms. Doing it the second time around, it didn’t seem to be as bad. After he mopped out of there, he proceeded to mop through the whole pub. As the floors dried he went ahead and put the chairs down from were they were placed upside down on top of the tables and wiped off the tables once more.

“See! Some of that bartending is coming back to ya,” Chas says happily.

“More like ‘you made me do this last night twice before I got it right’. That’s what’s coming coming back.”

“Still something. You can go and take a break after that.”

He finishes up and goes in the backroom. There, he saw Liv in the kitchen making herself some scrambled eggs. Remembering how she reacted to his cooking last night, he’s grateful he doesn’t have to make her anything else.

Liv turns around to face him. “Shame that amnesia took your cooking skills away,” she says with a sarcastic pout. “Then again, who’s to say you had any in the first place?”

“Didn’t your brother teach  _ you _ any manners?”

Liv scoffs, “Whatever.”

She plates up her eggs and quickly ate them and drops the dirty dish in the sink. She grabs her bag that’s been hanging on one of the chairs and throws it on her back. She heads towards the pub before she stops in front of Robert.

“Oh, before I forget,” she says as she takes a mesh bag of clothes she had by the bookshelf and hands it to Robert, “I need this cleaned by tomorrow.”

“Then clean it yourself,” Robert replies with a confused look on his face. 

Liv inhales a breath through her teeth. “I mean I would, but I don’t know how to use the washer,” she says dramatically as she shakes her head. “Yeah so, me and the laundry equal bad news,” she says as she puts her arms up as an X. 

Robert could see that she was just trying to get out of it.

“Besides, Aaron told me to let  _ you _ do it to help you re-mem-ber,” she intonates. “Doesn’t that just work out swell?,” she says with a quick forced smile. 

“You know what-”

“Oops! Gotta go,” she says as she runs away.

Robert clenches his fists.  _ What an irritating little- _ he takes a deep breath.  _ It’s ok. Just calm down. She’s gone and you don’t need to lose any more nerves after losing all your memories. _

He sits on the couch and turns on the tv to distract himself. The news channel was on but nothing interesting was being reported it seemed. He lifts the remote to change the channel when Paddy bustles in through the back door. Robert looks at him as Paddy searches around for a bit until finally he has to ask.

“What are you doing?”

“I-um, I was looking for Aaron. You haven’t seen him around have you?”

“I’ve been helping Chas with opening the pub so, no, I haven’t seen him. What you need him for?”

“Actually it’s you that I need but I just wanted to ask if he talked with you first about it.”

“About what?”

“You coming to help me for a bit at the veterinary office. It’s just that Pearl’s sick and a lot of papers have started to pile up and we’re all busy with appointments that it’s just been- ”

“Okay, okay. I get what you mean.” 

“So I take it he hasn't told you about this?”

“No, but I’d rather help you with some paperwork than have to be here for another rush.”

“Hah! Yeah. I guess I’ll ask Chas if she can let you go for a couple hours, if you don’t mind that is.”

“Sure!,” Robert eagerly agreed. 

“That’s that then,” Paddy says with a quick nod and continues to stand there for an awkward pause.

“Soo..” 

“Oh! Right. Chas. I’ll, uhh, be right back.” Paddy hurries through towards the pub and after about a minute or so comes back in and give Robert the thumbs up. “Alright then, come along.”

Robert follows Paddy as they exit the Woolpack and walk over to the Veterinary. As Paddy struggled with getting the door to unlock, Robert took a chance to look at the stone building. It was quaint and had a very homey feeling about it. It seemed to fit in well with its surroundings as the whole village seems to hold on to its traditional design. Paddy finally gets the door unlocked and they both walk in. 

Robert looks around the cluttered office that seems to also work as the reception area. Paddy was not joking when he said there was a pile of paperwork to be done as the stack of papers on the desk was at least 4 times the thickness of Paddy’s old laptop computer sitting beside it. Robert walks around the desk and pulls out the rolling chair that has a garish crochet blanket resting over it. 

“Ok, so here are a couple of invoices that need to be logged in and the comments that need to be put in for the pets we saw this last week. Easy stuff.”

“Thanks,” Robert says as he sits down and opens the laptop. 

“Right, I’ll be in here if you need me,” Paddy says as he walks into the back surgery room leaving Robert by himself. 

The computer is already unlocked and it seemed to be up and running, judging by the way the fan kicked on immediately. If Robert thought that the desk was messy with all the papers lying about, that was nothing compared to what was going on the screen here. There were at least 5 visible pop-up windows and all were for advertisements on shopping deals or clothes. He took a moment to take it all in. He moved his hand over to the trackpad and began to and exit out of each of the pop up ads and that took a while considering the mouse took at least a minute to travel from one end of the screen to the other. He minimized what looked like the main program only to find more pop up ads behind it.  _ No wonder nobody wants to do the paperwork! It'll take ages with all that going on.  _ After he finally cleared everything from that could be slowing down the laptop and found that he now has a normal functioning computer. He did it all so easily that he didn't even notice his second nature it was for him to use a computer. 

He started on the mountain of paperwork and easily figured out what information goes where and got the all comments typed in pretty quickly. About half an hour passed and he had only a quarter of the paperwork remaining to be put in. He was surprised just how quickly he had got it all done and that's when he realized that this is something he must have done before. He must have been really used to working on a computer with all different types of information before his amnesia. It made him feel confident that he was actually starting to get somewhere in finding himself again that he immediately wants someone to know. 

He gets up and tries to find Paddy in the surgery. He sees him near the back cuddling a puppy as he soothes his whimpers. 

“Shhh… it's ok puppy. Shhhh,” Paddy whispers to the little pup.

Robert looks at him and sees him turn around with a little German Shepard in his arms. He clears his throat as he tries to get Paddy’s attention. 

“Oh! Hiya. Everything going alright?,” Paddy asks.

“Yeah, almost done with the paperwork.”

“Really! That was fast.”

“Got the computer working faster by getting rid of all those ads you had on there.”

“That's great! Ha, you must be one of ‘em computer whizzes.”

“That's what I wanted to tell you. I think I remember doing this type of work, you know from before.”

“Really?,” Paddy says optimistically. 

“Yeah, I feel as if I did this kind of stuff everyday compared to the stuff in the pub.”

“That's great news! I'm happy for ya.”

Robert smiles as he's glad to have someone that believes in him.

“Well, if you’re ever bored, you can always come here and help out-” Paddy’s phone starts to ring. “Oh sorry,” he tells Robert as he awkwardly takes his phone out of his coat pocket while holding the puppy in one hand and answers the phone. 

“Hi. Yeah, he’s here,” he pauses as he looks at Robert, “Ok ...Ok…. Yeah, I'll send him over. Alright, bye.” He hangs up the phone, “That was Chas. She needs you back at the pub.”

Robert scrunches his face at the thought of going back there. Knowing he can't do anything about it, he rolls his eyes as he says, “Fine, guess I’ll go.” He turns to leave the surgery office when he feels Paddy catch him by the arm.

“Hey, thanks for helping out,” Paddy says with gratitude. He lets go of Robert’s arm and puts his hand out for Robert to shake. The one not holding the puppy. Robert shakes his hand back and smiles. 

Robert heads on over to the pub and sees Chas is busy serving customers their food and the bar has a lot of thirsty folks waiting for a drink so he gets behind the bar and starts to help out. After that mini rush was over, Chas turned to him with a suspicious look on her face.

“What’s got you so happy all of a sudden?,” she asks teasingly.

“I just, uh, feel like something coming back to me.”

“Really?! Well, I'm glad my training paid off!”

“Not here Chas! At Paddy’s. Being behind a computer, I felt like it was where I am meant to be.”

“Of course you're gonna say that. Sitting at a computer is ten times easier than running a pub.”

“But what I mean is the reports! All the data that I saw there, I felt like working with numbers was something that I did a lot. I mean I don’t know for sure, but it felt right,” he says enthusiastically. 

“Oh. I see. Well that's great! That means you’re getting back in the groove of things, right?”

“I hope so.”

Chas smiles at him, “Good.”

“Yeah,” Robert pauses.

Chas nods her head and then claps her hands which surprises Robert. “Now, since we got through that crowd, I think the rest of the day should be pretty quiet, don't you think?”

“I guess so.”

“Which means,” Chas says as she goes in the back and pulls out a broom, “you can start the cleaning.”

“What? I already swept the floors this morning before I mopped!”

“I mean cleaning the house. We’re overdue for a good deep clean so since there’s time for it now, why not?”

“But-”

“No buts!,” she says as she shoves the down in his hand, “Come on, you'll need to vacuum, clean the windows, dust the bookshelves, all that good stuff.”

Robert groans. 

He starts to reluctantly go into the back when Chas calls out to him from the bar, “You can also start the laundry! Kill two birds with one stone.”

He just stands still for a second and leans his head back as he takes a deep inhale and then breathes it all out. He resigns himself to what he must do and starts to sweep the living room, moving things out of the way to make sure he gets all the trash cleared away. After he got most of the trash into a neat pile on the floor, he puts the broom up against a wall and goes to search for a dustpan. He goes upstairs to search for a closet or wherever it is that the cleaning supplies are located in this place. He opens a door and sees the washer and dryer in there along with a bunch of other supplies to the side.  _ Oh right, the laundry. I’ll do that in a sec.  _ He spots a dustpan in the corner and grabs it. He heads back downstairs and goes to clear the dirt pile away but sees that it was now all over the place again!  _ WHAT HAPPENED!  _

“Hey Robert,” Liv says from the kitchen.

“Liv! I just sweeped here.”

“Oh….. soz,” she says as she shrugs her shoulders. 

Robert groans, “Watch where you’re stepping, ok?”

“Yeah, sure,” she says nonchalantly as she leaves the kitchen going through the same area where all the trash was spread about. 

_ Teenagers,  _ Robert thinks spitefully. He sweeps the floor once more and gets all the trash thrown away. He remembers the washer so he grabs the mesh bag full of dirty clothes and takes it upstairs. He gets to the washer and stands still. It looked like a simple box but the buttons at the top looked like a control panel from a sci-fi movie that he randomly seemed to remember.  _ How in the world can anyone use this?  _ He tries to rack his brain to see if he can remember how to use one of these machines and he doesn’t feel any memories coming back to him. He wonders how exactly he’ll be able to get this done so, since nothing was coming to mind, he leaves the bag there until he can find out how to work the washer. He heads back downstairs and sees Chas pulling a vacuum and a small bag filled with cans and something with a handle sticking out. 

“There you are,” she says as she places the bag done beside the vacuum. “Here’s the rest of the stuff you’ll need to get the place nice and clean.”

“Hey about the laundry-” 

“Sorry, gotta get back to the bar.” 

Robert looks down at what she has left for him.  _ Guess I gotta ‘get to it’ _ . He grabs the vacuum and observes it. He doesn’t feel anything coming back to him but at least here there is only one button and that was the power button. He clicks it and it lets out a loud whirring that startles Robert. He worries that something might be wrong with it but seeing that it isn’t bursting into flames, he assumes that the loud noise is normal for the vacuum. He tries to move it and it does but in an upright position.  _ Weird.  _ He pushes the vacuum with the handle and finds it really difficult with the way the handle is shaped.  _ This can’t be how this thing is supposed to move...is it?  _ He turns it off and observes the vacuum a little closer. He sees a pedal of sorts at the bottom and steps on it. The back of the vacuum falls straight to the floor.  _ Oh. Well that works.  _ He picks it back up and powers on the vacuum. He then starts the deep cleaning process by vacuuming the floors and the carpets. After he gets done with that, he looks into the bag and sees a can of window cleaner, a couple of rags, and a duster. He grabs the feather duster and looks around to see where it was dusty. The bookshelf seemed to be the worst in terms of dust so he goes over and starts slightly shaking the duster over each shelf. Not much was happening so he started to shake the duster more vigorously which did get the dust off the shelf but into his face. He sneezes. He shakes his head trying to get the dust off his face and continues to dust the rest of the shelves. He then goes over to the drapes and dusts them down. Thankfully there wasn’t much dust on them but they did become brighter after he finished getting the dust off them. After he gets done dusting the place, he gets the window cleaner and a rag. He squirts some of the cleaner onto the window and wipes it across the window with the rag. It took him a while to get each panel done but he finally got it done. He’s about to grab the bag filled with trash to take out when Chas walks in.

“Wow! You did a good job!”

“Thanks. I’m just about done.”

“You did the upstairs and all too?,” Chas asks in surprise.

“The what?”

“You know, the bedrooms and the bathrooms?”

“No, I didn't think I was doing them.”

“Oh, you still got time. Make sure you get it all done before tonight, ok?”

“But-”

“Thanks!,” Chas says as she goes out the back door. 

He just looks at the ceiling above him thinking of everything else he has to do now.  _ Just when I thought I was all done. _ He hears a rush of steps coming from upstairs and he turns to see what it is. He saw Liv rush into the room. 

“Did you do the laundry?,” she asks hurriedly. 

Robert remembered that after all the stuff he did today, he didn't even get a chance to ask how to use the washer. “No Liv. I don’t know how to do it.”

“Oh really?,” she says in a condescending tone. 

“Yes! In case you’ve forgotten, I have amnesia so I’m not exactly running on full cylinders.”

“Fine. I’ll show you how to do it but you’ll have to do it from now on. I have stuff I need to do for school.”

“So you do know how to use it!,” he says as he catches her out on her lie. 

“Fine I lied. So what?”

“So what? Telling lies is not good.”

“Pshh. You’re not gonna do anything about it.”

“Oh you bet I wi-”

“Look. If you want help, shut up and follow me.”

Liv stomps up the stairs and Robert stands there in shock. He never thought a teenager could be this much trouble. He puts a hand to his face.  _ This day is just never going to end is it? _

“Come on Robert!,” Liv calls from upstairs.

Chas walks back in.

“What are you doing standing around? Go on. The house isn’t going to clean itself.”

_ Ughhh, how much longer do I have to endure all of this? _

* * * * *

Robert was done. Not with the cleaning but with life. The cleaning was never ending. The customers were never happy. Chas always found something for him to do. Liv always found a way to get on his nerves. The days were too long and the nights were too short. He never got any rest or any sleep after being on that thing they call a couch. There is nothing remotely good about his existence. 

It all got to a point where after a week in, he cracked. 

He was sitting at the table, just to relax his feet for a few minutes, and all he could think of was the list of things he still had left to do.  _ Clean this, wash that, serve the drink, deliver the food, listen to Chas, listen to Liv, do this, do that, no sleep, no rest, no anything. _ He has all these thoughts on a loop and it wasn't until Chas came into the back room searching for him that he was discovered in his comatose state. She sees him with his eyes wide open, staring at nothing, and she calls out to him but doesn't get a response. She starts to get worried and gets her phone out to call Aaron. 

“Aaron!”

“Hey mum, what is it?”

“It's Robert! I don't know what's wrong but he isn't responding! He took a break about an hour ago and when I walked in to look for him, I see him sitting in the chair looking at nothing. I tried talking to him but his eyes just look glazed over! I don't know what's wrong!”

“Don't worry mum. I'm on my way!”

Aaron hangs up and quickly gathers his stuff from the office. Thankfully, he didn’t have any remaining appointments and all he had left to do was the paperwork but that can wait. He gets in his car and rushes over to Emmerdale. He gets to the Woolpack and bursts into the back room. He sees Chas and Liv sitting around Robert. 

“Aaron! Thank goodness,” Chas says.

“Is everything ok? What happened?,” Aaron asks, slightly out of breath. 

“Well, he's just been sitting here and a couple minutes ago he just started going 'buh-buh buh-buh-buh’ and then he stopped again,” Liv says. 

“I see.”

“Is he having a breakdown?,” Liv asks Chas.

“I don't know. I haven't seen anything like this,” Chas says in a low tone as she slowly shook her head. 

Aaron steps closer to Robert and puts a hand on his shoulder. No response. He tries to squeeze it, still nothing. He starts to shake Robert with some force and still, nothing. Aaron feels at a loss since he doesn't know what could be wrong. He leans down to where he is face to face with Robert. 

“Robert.”

Nothing.

“Hey, Robert!,” he says as he shakes a hand in front of his face. 

Still nothing.

“What's for dinner?”

Robert’s mouth starts to slightly move. 

“.........buh-buh-buh…...buh buh-buh buh”

Aaron smiles that he got a response out of him but then feels a smack at the back of his head. “Ow! What was that for?”

“He's barely even making sense and you’re asking what's for dinner?,” Chas asks appalled. “Sometimes I wonder if you've even got a brain up there.”

“Well, it worked!”

“Fine. So now what?”

Aaron just shrugs his shoulders, “I don’t know. Maybe all he needs is some fresh air and he'll get out of whatever this is,” he says as he gestures his hand at Robert from top to bottom. 

Chas and Liv look at each other and shrug. Taking that as a sign of approval, Aaron tries to get Robert out of his chair by lifting him up but Robert just falls back down like a dead weight. So then Aaron goes to put an arm behind his back and one under his knees and lifts him up into his arms. He “princess-carries” Robert out the door and into the back alley of the pub. There, he sets him down on one of the outdoor tables and waits for the fresh air to take effect. After about a minute or so, he still showed no sign of coming back to normal, still muttering nonsense under his breath. Getting desperate to find some way to wake Robert out of his state, Aaron looks around the alley and sees a water hose.  _ That should do it! _ He grabs the long hose, unspools it until he is right in front of Robert’s face, and he presses his finger on the sprayer trigger. 

The water comes gushing out of the the water hose and all over poor Robert who’s body quickly came alive to the sensation of almost being drowned. He bolted upwards as he gasped for air and gripped onto the sides of the table to steady himself. Aaron takes his finger away and stops the water sprayer. 

Robert’s hair is sticking to his forehead and a few droplets start dripping from his face, Robert takes deep breaths and slowly looks up at Aaron in front of him. His expression quickly goes from frightened to full of menace. This is an expression Aaron had seen before when Robert started going off on him about the seat covers. 

Aaron’s heart stops. _ He figured it out.  _

Robert lifts his hand to point at Aaron. He starts to shake his finger at him as he opens his mouth wider and growls out, “YOU!”

“Look-”

“You have made my life a living nightmare!”

“Wai-”

“I had to clean toilets! I had to clean all your dirty clothes! I had to clean this entire house! I had to look after YOUR ungrateful brat! I HAD TO WORK THIS WHOLE PUB BY MYSELF! AND ALL OF THIS IS BECAUSE OF YOU!”

Aaron’s insides curl up on him and twist as the feeling of guilt takes over. This was only meant to be payback for the cruelty Robert himself inflicted on him but in the end, Aaron felt he was the more cruel one. “I’m sor-”

“DON’T EVEN THINK SORRY IS ENOUGH FOR THE HELL YOU MADE ME LIVE THROUGH! I mean,” Robert pauses for a second as he tries to find the words, “there is no way, NO WAY, I could have done ALL this before by myself.”

_ What? _ Aaron thinks.

“There is just no way it is possible for one person to do all these jobs. Why is it only me and Chas that work the pub? Why is Marlon the only chef in the place with the amount of orders we get even when it’s slow? Did somebody quit?,” Robert asks earnestly, “not that I would blame them.”

Aaron pauses. _He didn’t figure it out._ _HE DIDN’T FIGURE IT OUT!_ Relief flows throughout his body as he sees that Robert still hasn’t remembered anything and everything was back to how it was in the original plan, Robert works off his debt and then Aaron gets him to where he belongs. 

“Are you even paying attention?!,” Robert shouts.

Aaron clears his throat and any feelings of guilt he had, “Yes, sorry. I’m listening.”

“Well?!”

“Um, you’re right. It is a bit much for one person to handle-”

“A bit?!,” Robert exclaims in outrage.

“Okay, well, the only other person that was helping mum with the pub was Liv and even then that was when she had free time. My mum did all the rest.”

Robert got quiet. “Chas did this all herself?” 

“Yeah. She was the one that did ALL that before you and then some,” Aaron emphasizes, “and she can’t hire anyone since we’ve barely been making ends meet.”

Robert looks down at the ground. 

“So yeah, I'm sorry that there isn't anyone else to help you. That's just what happens when you barely have enough cash to keep everything from falling apart.”

Robert keeps his head down. He quickly darts his eyes to look up at Aaron and just as quickly looks away. 

“Are you still mad?”

“No,” Robert says after a long pause. “It’s just- I guess I’m just really frustrated that I'm not remembering anything,” he says as he looks up at Aaron. “I'm doing everything that I did before I lost my memory and still, nothing.”

“That's okay. It might take a while but we’ll all try to help you out,” Aaron says with a smile knowing that Robert will be just fine whenever he finishes working off his debt.

“Really? Why?”

“Because we like you.”

Robert lifts his head and gives Aaron a questioning look. 

Aaron in turn spreads his arms. “Come here.”

Robert sighs and gets up from the table and walks into Aaron’s open arms. He puts his head gently on Aaron’s shoulder and lets Aaron enfold him. Even though Robert feels that Aaron is still some stranger to him, and at times the devil, he has to admit, Aaron can be nice sometimes. He accepts the comfort of a warm embrace and feels himself calm down from his earlier tantrum. While his head gets quieter, his heart on the other hand gets louder. He doesn’t know if it's because this is just his body reacting to hugging someone or if it's because this is the first time he and Aaron have been this close to each other since their kiss at the hospital. He mentally shakes his head. He puts his arms around Aaron’s waist and holds on a little tighter. 

Aaron feels Robert’s grip get tighter so he begins to softly move his hand back and forth across his back, as if he was trying to soothe him. After a couple of seconds, Aaron’s hand stops and he tries to back out of their hug but Robert’s not letting go. His hands are still in two little fists clutching onto the back of Aaron’s hoodie. Aaron feels an inkling of something warm spreading through his stomach and up his throat.  _ That’s probably my guilty conscious coming back up.  _ But would a guilty conscious make his heart beat as fast as it was right then? 

Robert squeezed Aaron’s frame one last time before letting go and backing away from him. He looks into his eyes with an expression softer than anything Aaron saw before. 

“I think I needed that. Thanks,” he says in a soft hushed tone. 

Aaron’s eyes widen and he feels himself staring at Robert. He feels something tickling inside himself, which he did not like. “Sure,” Aaron says with nonchalance trying to shake that tickling feeling off, “as long as it helps.”

Robert takes one deep breath, “Well.”

“Guess you need a break after all that huh?”

“No, I gotta get back to the pub, rush is about to start and Chas will need some help. Also, I gotta get dinner started so there’s no time to take a break.”

“But are you sure you are ok? You did check out there for a little bit.”

“I feel fine. I just got overwhelmed and maybe my brain needed some time to catch up.”

“Okay then, but if you do start feeling woozy, take a break, yeah?”

Robert chuckles softly, “Don’t worry.” He starts to move towards Aaron and pats on the shoulder, “I’ll be fine,” he says hastily and then makes his way past Aaron and into the pub. 

Aaron stands there for a second contemplating what just happened. He was ‘this close’ to having this whole charade being blown apart. The guilt he felt in that moment weighed heavily on Aaron but now that the moment was over, Aaron had to tell himself  _ This is payback. He didn’t pay and he never will pay so this is the only way to get even with him. Nobody even came to get him from the hospital so I’m doing him the favor of putting him back where he belongs after he’s done paying me back. Makes sense.  _ Aaron shakes his head.  _ It’s only for a couple more weeks. That’s all and he’ll be gone.  _

It was terrifying to see Robert angry but it was not as terrifying as to what Aaron felt when Robert was soft. Aaron took his hand and put it against his chest as he remembered how his friendly hug had turned into something a little more. He can’t remember the last time he had someone that close to him. There was something inside him, something from a distant memory, that seemed to flare up and Aaron’s eyes widen. He can’t let anything happen. This is a man paying him back for screwing him over a deal and after he is done, they will never see each other again. The way it should be. He doesn’t need any complicated emotions over this. 

* * * * *

Robert had finished up serving dinner, which was getting better with each one he tried, and was cleaning up whatever was left on the table. As Robert was standing at the sink in the kitchen, Aaron and Liv are sitting on the couch watching some tv. Aaron was in a hoodie and some dark sweatpants while Liv was in some comfy pajamas and wrapped up in a blanket. Liv is looking at Robert and shifting as she sits. It’s when Robert runs the water and starts doing the dishes that she whips her head facing Aaron.

“Aaron,” she says in a whisper.

“What?,” he says, still focused on the tv.

“You think he’ll figure it out? Especially after what happened yesterday?”

Aaron now looks at her, “Uh… no.”

“You hesitated.”

“No I didn’t.”

“You did. If he remembers anything, he could stitch you up for kidnapping or ‘adultnapping’, whatever  _ this _ is.”

“Liv, you have nothing to worry about. There is nothing, absolutely nothing here that could trigger his memory back. I mean, he lived in a mansion and unless this house transforms overnight, I’d say we are as far off from a mansion as possible,” he says in a rush making sure his voice isn’t too loud that Robert can hear. 

“I just-,” Liv pauses, “Do you think this debt is all that worth you going to prison?” 

“Liv, it’ll never come to that. He’ll work here a couple weeks and then as soon as we’re even, he’ll go back to his snuggly little life and I’ll be rid of him.” 

“If you’re sure.”

“I am. Stop worrying,” he says with a chuckle as he wraps an arm around Liv.

Liv groans and quickly retracts from Aaron. They continue to watch the latest episode of some reality show. Robert finishes up the dishes and sits down to join them. Just as he does so, a woman on the program starts talking. 

“ _ It’s silly, I know but ever since I was a child, I had this one photo were I was still just a little baby. Maybe 3, maybe 5 months old. And in that photo, I just knew that this man holding me so gently in his arms and the woman beside him must have been someone really special to me. I never knew who it was that was holding me. I always kept that photo for years and years and when I finally found out I was adopted, I asked my parents about this photo and they didn’t have a clue who it was either. But that didn’t stop me though, or them as a matter of fact. We got to researching libraries, old articles, and it was one obscure small town article about a missing girl that had this same photo as the image. Turns out I was a missing child for about 24 years! I had my doubts about it at first but when I went back to the adoption center that my parents got me from, the head manager there explained how one morning they just found me on their doorstep with only this photo in my blanket. So, in a small town maybe 200 miles away, someone took me from my parents and then just dropped me off. It really is a miracle that I can now be a part of both my parents’ worlds all from just a single photo _ .”

"Are they for real with this? There is no way that story's real," Liv interjects. 

The woman on the program chokes up on some tears as her new found family comforts her by patting her shoulder. The host of the program asks some more questions about the process they went through and what they had in their future plans together before he closes out the program and the credits roll. 

Liv starts to yawn and gets up off the couch. “I’m off to bed,” she says as she drags her blanket along with her. 

“‘Night,” Aaron calls out as she leaves and goes upstairs. 

That left Robert and Aaron alone on the couch. Watching that program made Robert feel some hope for his lost memories, unlike what happened earlier in the day.  _ See? All this woman had was a photo and she found everything she had lost. If she can do it, maybe, I can too.  _ Robert turns his head over to the side so that he is facing Aaron. 

“Hey Aaron,” he calls out. 

“Hm?”

“Do you know where I might have some old photos lying around?”

This peaks Aaron’s attention, not in the good way. 

“I mean,” Robert continues, “there has to be something. Maybe it’ll help me remember.”

Aaron’s face drops but he quickly recovers saying, “We might have lost them when you moved here.”

Robert looked confused, “Do you mean to tell me there is no photographic evidence of me, of our life together... anywhere in existence?

“Ughhh,” Aaron says as his eyes quickly dart from one direction to the other, his thoughts scattering around trying to come up with a reason. “I’m sure they might be somewhere around. Just never bothered to look for them before.”

“Well, if you won't be bother, where can I look for them then?,” Robert asks, getting more frustrated. 

“Oh, who knows,” Aaron says, trying to end the conversation quickly. But as he looks at Robert’s face, he sees that his determined eyes and frowning eyebrows weren’t going to let it go. Sadly that realization didn’t come quick enough and Robert got up off the couch and stormed his way upstairs. Aaron quickly got up off the couch and followed Robert up as he went into Aaron’s bedroom. 

Robert started opening up drawers at random, trying to see where the photos might be. 

“Robert-”

Robert stops for a second and faces Aaron. He was at a loss and Aaron could see it in his face. “Aaron, you don’t know what’s like. To not know who you are. To not know what you are. I came here knowing only one thing and that was that my name is Robert and nothing else. Do you understand?! Nothing else has come back to me!”

Aaron could feel the guilt start to curl up in his stomach once more. He was getting more and more nervous by the second.

“So, don’t try to stop me. I need something. Just some proof that this,” He spread his arms out, “is who I am, what I am. Something that will spark some wisp of a memory.”

Aaron starts to tug on his hoodie’s strings out of nervousness. “You don’t even know what you’re looking for. Just-,” Aaron looks down and takes a deep breath, “let me look for them and I’ll give them to you as soon as I find them. Okay?,” with one string almost all the way down to his waist. 

Robert kept staring at Aaron and his frustration started to melt away but not from knowing that Aaron will look for the photos but instead from what Aaron just did. That movement, something about that seemed familiar.

“That hoodie,” Robert focuses on it before he looks up, “and you.”

“What?,” Aaron asks. Now it’s his turn to be confused. 

“No, it’s just you…,” Robert trails off as he gestures his hand at Aaron.

“That's right. This is me...and I'm wearing my hoodie.”

“Something’s familiar,” Robert says as a fuzzy memory starts to fade into his mind of Aaron in that hoodie standing a long stretch of pavement near a white car and a sinking feeling in his chest.

Aaron couldn’t think of what in the world could seem familiar to Robert. His hoodie of all things. “What?”

“I don’t know,” Robert shakes his head. “I think- I remember a white car.”

Aaron is still confused at what Robert was saying until it hits him. He’s actually remembering something now.  _ I gotta stop this now. _

“Uhhh, yeah. You got it,” Aaron says with a snap of his fingers, “We would, uh, sometimes go to the garage and, um, take a car out for a spin.”

“Really?,” Robert raises an eyebrow, “Why in the world would we do that?”

“I mean-,” Aaron flusters, “for a thrill?”

“Then why is it your hoodie that I’m remembering and not the car itself?!” 

“Maybe,” Aaron’s thoughts were scrambling, “it’s because you remember when we were…uhhh, you know.” Aaron tilts his head to the side and lifts his eyebrows as if to suggest something of the embarrassing nature.

Robert stares at him with his face scrunched in confusion until it dawns on him what Aaron actually means. His eyes widen. “You mean… we did it… in some random's car?”

Aaron doesn’t say anything and just shrugs his shoulders. 

Robert is truly at a loss for words. “I-”

Seeing as the situation is only going to get worse from here, Aaron decides to shut it down as quickly as he can. “Anyway, just let me take care of it. I’m sure I’ll find them by tomorrow.”

Robert is still trying to gather himself from the fact that sometime in the past he was fine with literally doing it anywhere but Aaron's reassurance about finding their pictures seems to have grounded him back to the present. “Fine,” he said disgruntled.

“Now, I’m going to bed so you should do the same.” 

Robert shakes his head as he walks out the bedroom and down the stairs. Aaron could hear that he made it down the stairs when he heard the door slam. Now he was left with a problem, where is he going to get those pictures from? There have to be photos of him online somewhere but there can’t be anything that shows that he lived in a farming village. Robert’s some rich, poncy business man that probably never saw dirt in his life until now.  _ How am I going to pull this off? _ Aaron thinks in despair.  _ Wait, maybe…. I can fake ‘em. That’s right! _ He knew he just needed something to satisfy Robert. He quickly gets out of the room and walks towards Liv’s bedroom and knocks. He hears a disgruntled groan. That meant she must still be awake so he walks in.

“Liv?”

She groans as she slowly sits up in her bed, “Come on, I was just about to-”

Aaron sits down on the edge of her bed beside her. “Yeah, yeah. I’m sorry but I really need a favor.”

“Really? Now?”

“Yes, now. You’re good with editing pictures right?”

“Sure, why?”

“Robert wants photos of his past... our past together.”

“Well how am I supposed to do that?”

“I’ll give you some pictures of me and you can find his picture online. Just try to make it look like he is from around here.”

“It’d be hard to make it look like you guys were together though.”

“Then,” Aaron pauses for a moment, “I’ll just send you some of me and Jackson.” He gets a sad look on his face, “That should be ok right?”

“Aaron, are you sure-”

“Yeah,” he stands up abruptly. “I mean, it’s just a picture right?” 

“I guess.”

Aaron takes a deep breath. “Ok. So can you get this done by sometime tomorrow? Like ten photos?”

“Ughhh, fine,” Liv says as she reaches for her laptop.

“Thanks,” he says. He leans over and tries to give her a hug from the side with one arm. 

“Ahh! Get off.”

* * * * *

True to his word, Aaron came to Robert as soon as Liv got him the fixed up photos. Robert was at the bar when Aaron approached with a large envelope. 

“What’s this then?,” Robert asked as he was cleaning a glass.

“The photos you asked for. Told ya I’d find ‘em,” Aaron says triumphantly.

Robert puts the glass down and grabs the envelope. Robert feels excited, which is something that he hadn't felt in a while, as he opens the envelope tab and grabs the photos out of it. He starts to look through each one and Aaron sees his face frown more and more with each one he sees.

“Hmm…”

“What?,” Aaron asks.

“It’s just… I don’t understand why, um,” Robert just scrunches his face and looks at Aaron, who stared back at him with a look of confusion. Robert takes a photo in his hand and to show Aaron what he was looking at. 

The picture showed Robert in a suit looking away to the side while his hand, that was a strange bright white, was in front of himself as if to block the camera from taking a photo. That seemed normal to Aaron until he noticed a grassy scenery with a farmhouse in the background.

“Why would I be wearing a suit if I’m out on some farm?”

“Eh,” Aaron stalls as he tries to come up with a reason as to how this paparazzi shot of Robert could be related to the current life Robert has as a bartender, “cuz that is... when you… went to… uh…”

“Well?”

“Your friend’s wedding!”

“Really?”

“Yup, and uh, you really didn't want to have your picture taken while you were in that state but uh, the photographer insisted on making as many memories of the event as he could.”

Robert looked back at the photo.

“Definitely more of a quantity over quality guy.”

“I can see that,” Robert says with a heavy tone of sarcasm. He continues to look at the next photo and sees himself with a smug smile on his face, full of confidence as he sips at a beer. He was sitting in a booth, dressed in a tight gray sweater, and had his hair falling over his eyes.

“Guess this is from a night out?,” he asks as he shows Aaron the photo.

Aaron looks at the photo and admires how nice Robert looked in it, smiling to himself. “Uh, yeah. It was from when we went out last month or so.”

“Hmm.” Robert looks at the next one. This one really catches his eye as it shows Aaron hunched over as he looks down at Robert as he was sitting. They were both looking deeply into each other's eyes and Robert could see a genuine smile on Aaron’s face. Robert was a bit shocked at the intimacy the photo portrayed on Aaron’s part as he doesn't think he ever saw Aaron look that way at him before. But then again, he can't remember anything from ‘before’. He couldn't quite make out where they were though. 

“Where was this taken?,” he asks as he hands Aaron the photo.

Aaron grabs it and Robert could immediately see his expression soften and seemingly grow sad. 

“This was uh,” Aaron pauses, “Whitby. We went to the seaside that day.” Aaron continued to look at the photo for a second or two before he cleared his throat, turned it over and handed it back to Robert. “Nothing special really happened that day,” Aaron says in a quieter tone as he averts his eyes to the floor.

Robert took the photo back and continued to look at the next couple of photos and he noticed that they all showed Robert seemingly getting worse and worse until he reached one where he looked completely wiped out. Dark circles under his eyes, pupils dilated, and an unkempt shirt all made him look as if he had given up on life at this point.

“Why do I have this depressed look on my face?”

“Well, you were grumpy a lot. You were losing weight and all that.”

“Was I always this miserable? Wasn't I ever happy?”

“Well, sure. Lots.” Aaron could see that Robert was doubting him but to Aaron, his job was done. “All right. You got your photos. Are you satisfied?” 

Robert looks back down at the pile of photos before him and he can't really refute them. “Yes,” he says unenthusiastically. 

“Good,” Aaron says with a nod. Seeing that Robert wasn't saying else, he hurriedly makes his way to the back room. 

Robert lets out a heavy sigh. He puts his hands on the bar counter and leans forward to steady himself. As he lowers his head and pushes his weight onto the counter, he thinks about how none of those photos did anything for his memory. He thought at least one would spark something but all they did was make this dreary life he was currently living a reality. Heck, he was as miserable before as he is now. Robert has to accept that _ this _ is his life now, without question. “I suppose I belong here in this,” Robert shudders, “...hovel.”

“Ey! Any chance of me getting served ‘ere?!,” one of the people at the bar shouted at Robert.

_ Well, this is my life. I didn't marry well, did I? _

* * * * *

Diane thought it was odd that Robert hadn't given her a call back after all this time, especially since it had been almost a month since the scuffle Robert had with Andy. She was growing more and more worried at the fact that she still had heard no word from either him or anybody else. It wasn't unlike him to not get in touch with the family, especially when there was a big row, but he would usually call her back if she had left him a voicemail. She had tried to call him again but she was still only able to reach his voicemail again. 

Frustrated at everything, she decides to try giving Chrissie another call. She dials her up and waits for the call to connect. After three rings, Chrissie finally picks up.

“Yes, Diane,” Chrissie answers in an exhausted tone.

“Chrissie, I hope I haven’t caught you at a bad time but-”

“Actually I am more than a bit busy at the moment.”

“Oh, yes. Well then I won’t take up too much of your time. I just wanted to ask if you have heard anything from Robert.”

“Not really. But I wouldn’t worry too much about him. He’s most likely on some last minute business trip if I had to guess."

“Really? Isn't it odd that you, as his fiancé, don't know where he is?,” Diane says as she emphasized the fiancé part.

“Look, Diane. We are both very busy people and I don’t have the time to always be watching him like a hawk when I’ve got my own things to take care of. This isn’t the first time he is off who knows where and I’m positive he is just fine,” Chrissie answers rather curtly. 

“But-,” Diane tries to plead. 

“Diane, I have another call coming through. Call his office if you’re that worried about him. Bye,” Chrissie says as she hangs up on Diane.

Diane was left bewildered at that interaction but she did at least get a good idea from it. She browsed through her little phone book that she kept by the phone and found the number to Robert’s office. 

“Thank you for contacting Sugden Agricultural Machinery. This is Leyla. What may I help you with?”

“Hello Leyla. This is Diane.”

“Oh yes!,” Leyla answers enthusiastically, “How are you Mrs. Sugden?”

“I’m just fine. I’m calling to see if you have any word as to where Robert is.”

“Uh, quite honestly, I’m not too sure.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, he hasn’t been to work in the past couple of weeks and we’ve heard no word from him on our end.”

“Is there anywhere he could be?,” Diane asks in a bit of a panicked tone.

“There was a retreat that he was invited to by one of the clients so he could have gone there to build up some more contacts along with Jimmy and Nicola. Since that retreat has little cell service, there is no getting through to anybody there.”

“I see. Thank you for letting me know.”

“Of course. Anything else I can help you with?”

“No, that’s all.”

“Alright, well you have a good day then,” Leyla says before Diane ends the call.

This puts Diane at ease since both Chrissie and Leyla feel that he must be on some business trip and that it is something they would normally expect of him. She thinks that maybe it would be best to call Victoria and let her know so that she isn’t out of her mind with worry as she had been the last few weeks herself. She dials her number from memory and gets an immediate response. 

“Hiya Diane!”

“Hello Victoria. How are you holding up pet?”

“I’m doing well so far. Tying up a few loose ends here and there. Why? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong which is what I'm calling you about. I called Robert’s office and I got word that he might be at a business retreat of some sort and there is no reception there so it’s likely he just hasn’t been able to get anybody's messages.” 

“Really?,” Victoria asks in an incredulous tone.

“Yes. Both Chrissie and Leyla seem to think that’s where he is.”

“They think? Wouldn’t Chrissie know for sure where he is?”

“Well Chrissie last told me that he went to Hotten for something and now she said that he might be on some business trip but you know her, she’s a busy lady so she doesn’t waste time worrying about others, or on her manners for that fact.”

_ Odd for him to go on some retreat without letting even Chrissie know,  _ Vic thinks but not wanting to worry Diane, decides to keep this thought to herself. “Okay. I’m glad you let me know.”

“I just didn’t want you to be worrying endlessly. I just wish Robert wasn’t this selfish to leave us all in this state.”

“Diane,” Vic starts.

“Sorry, pet. You know how I get when it comes to Robert. I just wish he would find a way to finally let go of whatever it is that is holding him back from making up with Andy and let us all be a family again.”

“It’s not that easy Diane.”

There is a beat of silence before Diane speaks again. “Anyway, I just wanted to let you know what was going on.”

“Right. Thanks Diane.”

“I’ll talk to you later. Bye now.”

“Bye,” Vic says as she hangs up the phone. 

While Diane moved on with her day after this talk, Vic wasn’t as carefree. This really wasn’t like the Robert she knew. Of course, he would sulk and distance himself from everybody else in the family but for his own fiancé to not have any real clue as to where he was, that got under Vic’s skin. 

_ He wouldn’t just disappear like this. He’s not one to go on such extravagant trips since he’s usually so focused on his work.  _ Vic can’t help but think that maybe the worst might have happened and everyone is to blind to see it or they simply don’t care enough to see it. 

She begins to think maybe he’s missing, hurt, or worse. She decides that there is no more time left to waste as she needs to find him, if only to eliminate the worst possible scenarios, so she starts to pack a few bits and pieces immediately. She grabs a small carry bag and fills it with some clothes, her passport, her laptop, and a bit of cash and sets off to go and find him. Remembering Diane mentioned Hotten being the last place he was known to go to for certain gave Vic at least something of a starting point. She got to her car, threw in her bag, and drove. 

After a couple of hours, she reached Hotten. She decided that the first place she would check out would be the hospital since that is the only place that made any sense for Robert to be in for almost a month. If he was hurt or unconscious, it made sense that he wouldn't be able to contact anyone until that state. But if he was worse- _No! I can't think like that if I want to find him,_ Vic thinks to herself. She drove around until she finally found the hospital and parked in the lot. 

As she walks into the hospital, she sees that the hospital lobby was not really busy which Vic was grateful for. She walks up to the service desk and sees an older woman behind the desk focused on the computer screen before she notices Vic in front of her. 

“Ooh!,” the woman exclaims as she jumps back a bit. “Gave me a bit of a fright there!,” she says with a bit of a laugh in her tone. 

“Sorry!”

“Oh don't you worry yourself sweetheart. What can I help you with?”

“Well I'm looking for my brother. I'm not sure if he's in here or not but I thought I'd give it a shot.”

“You poor girl. Of course I'll try to help you the best I can,” she says with optimism. 

“Okay. He is about six feet tall, lean frame, blonde, blue green eyes, freckles all over his face, and his name is Robert.”

“Hmm, about how long have you been looking for him?”

“It's been almost a month since I heard from him.”

The older woman’s face lit up. “I think we might have had him in here.”

“Had?”

“Yes, we had a Robert that matches that description here about a month ago and after about a week, someone had come by and already picked him up.”

“Really?”

“Oh yes. His husband was absolutely lovely. Those two really do make such a handsome couple.”

“His husband?,” Vic asks with a bit of surprise in her tone. 

“Yeah. Aaron I think it was. Ruggedly handsome brunette with a beard and gorgeous blue eyes. Poor fella was worried out of his mind until he found his Robert here.” 

“Right,” Vic said as she was starting to think that maybe this Robert the woman was describing wasn't her brother but something in her gut told her to not let this go.

The older lady continued, “I’m just grateful he lived so close to here otherwise he might never have found him.”

“And just how close is that?”

“Just the farming village nearby here. Emmerdale I think it was.”

_ Emmerdale. Worth at least checking out,  _ Vic thinks. She lets out a breath of relief now that she knows that Robert is at least not hurt or stuck in hospital here. She looks at the woman with a warm smile, “Thank you for letting me know he's safe.” 

“Sure thing. Glad I could help.”

Vic walks out of the hospital feeling slightly confused but overall relieved.  _ Is this really her brother Robert? Who was this Aaron? How was he Robert’s husband? Why would Robert go with him?  _ So many questions swirled around in her head but there was only one clear answer she could get for them all and that was Emmerdale. 


End file.
